The Fear Of The Kingdom
by ChsisAnialation
Summary: It managed to happen once again. Yuudai has been spirited away to a new world. A world of great beauty and evil. He and three others have been summoned to save the kingdom from a great catastrophe. Sadly, Yuudai being the Shield Hero leaves everyone with hate towards him. Watching as the world tries to condemn him, he presses on to become the fear that only he can instill.
1. The Heroes Arrival

Welcome everyone! I'd like to introduce you all to The Fear Of The Kingdom! Yes, it is another spin off of The Fear Of Mages, but I just can't help it. Yuudai is my guy that helps create stories!

So how are you all? I hope you are doing well. By the way, don't think Yuudai will take crap from everyone. That's definitely not his style. So yeah...read my fellow readers!

Chapter 1: The Heroes Arrival

Yuudai looks around the library once again. It has been a year since his adventures in Halkeginia. After arriving back to the academy, he sat down on a bench and, without any reason, started shimmering. Slowly his body began to disappear. He then opened his eyes after blinking to find himself in his bed.

He found that only his shadow gun rune is on his hand and Wales' ring on his finger. The other rune was nowhere to be found. Unfortunately, his rune hasn't been reacting to his will and the ring doesn't activate its speed and agility granting powers. It's no surprise since there isn't so much as a lick of Halkeginia's magic that he has learned powered his shadow gun. Once he saw that he couldn't have any other kind of possessions from Halkeginia, he became saddened.

He mourned for Halkeginia for months, but realized that it was useless. No amount of mourning could take him back. After that, he started spending most of his days in a library. Reading of stories that could finish off his own. Trying to find an ending for his journey rather than mourning what he already experienced.

Today is the same thing. He is walking around the section of the library most don't bother with going near. Not because he hates people's company, but because he has read the books that are over there. His eyes catch sight of some manga causing him to roll his eyes.

"Did I really walk myself over here?" Yuudai asks himself. Despite that remark, he walks over to the manga. His instincts tell him to move his hand above his head, so he does catching a odd book. He raises an eyebrow at it. "Am I being attacked by books now?"

He looks over the cover finding the designs of a sword, bow, spear and shield. Yuudai opens the book reading over the synopsis for the grand scheme of the story. The teen flips to the next page seeing it blank.

"Blank page? Lazy writing in a nutshell." Yuudai states closing his eye with a sigh. He opens his eyes to find himself in...a throne room. To his side a three others. A long haired blond guy has a spear, a short haired blond guy has a bow and the other black haired guy has a sword. "If this is what I'm thinking…" He looks at his arm to find a shield.

"Welcome four heroes. Please save our world!" A man with a cloak and short hair pleads. Yuudai suddenly feels the rush of excitement flow through him again. He hadn't felt this since Halkeginia. He doesn't stop his smirk from lining his face. "I understand this must come as a shock, but time is of the essence."

"Less of a shock and more of a blessing." Yuudai mutters imagining him fighting against all kinds of enemies. His eyes find his rune and ring feeling the energy flow off them again.

"Our country, Malromark, is in the middle of a crisis. A rift from another dimension has opened and monsters have come crawling into our world in great waves." The man explains. "When the first wave came, the kingdom's knights and adventurers were able were able to hold their own. However, the dragon hourglass has already begun to indicate the arrival of the next wave."

"Looks like I've been brought into the world of that book." Yuudai states to himself. He then remembers why he mustn't be so overhappy. Kingdom's are always corrupted. Knowing this, he drops the smirk looking around the large room.

His eyes only cross tons of guards. Not only guards, but civilians and the like. Yuudai finally catches sight of the king. He is sitting on a throne with a perfect white beard indicating he is not young anymore. The look in his eyes though...they hold loathe in them once he finds Yuudai looking at him.

The kingdom breaks eye contact to look them all over. "I am the king of these lands, Aultcray Melromarc the thirty second." The king introduces as if he had much better things to do. "If you are able to save this world, we will reward you all handsomely. Naturally, we will furnish the funds you need to assist in your efforts. Now then heroes, speak your names!"

The teen with a sword steps forward first. "My name is Ren Amaki. I'm sixteen. I'm a highschool student." He then steps back.

The short haired blond with the bow steps forward next. "My name is Itsuki Kawasumi and I'm seventeen years old. I'm also a highschool student."

The guy with the spear smiles at the king. "I'm Motoyasu Kitamura. I'm twenty one and in university." He introduces himself.

The king goes to speak, but Yuudai steps forward next. "The name is Yuudai. I'm eighteen." He states seeing no reason in giving him full name and schooling information. It is pointless in a different world.

The king glares at the teen. Yuudai notices this easily. Looks like he already has enemies in high places. Yuudai doesn't drop his gaze from the king. There is no way he will be brought to his knees by some guy he just met.

"Please check your status." The first guy instructs the four. Yuudai raises an eyebrow looking at the guy. He then notices something in the corner of his eye. It is an icon.

Suddenly a giant screen pops up in front of him. With the information of himself. Yuudai: Shield Hero level one. Equipment: Shield (Legendary Weapon), Other World Clothes, Ring Of Winds, Rune Of Darkness. His face is next to the information. Yuudai sees his defense more than half full and his agility plus speed full. His mp is empty along with a small amount of hp. His attack is about near the middle.

"I guess I'm going to have myself a fun time." Yuudai states grinning. He drops the grin a second later. "Once I leave this room, at least."

"This is like a vrmmo." The teen with a sword says. "I'm pretty sure I played one like this before."

Yuudai gives him a confused look. "I haven't heard of that before. I mean I've heard of virtual reality, but for an mmo? Sounds ridiculous." Yuudai comments.

"Oh, you mean Emerald Online?" Motoyasu asks smiling. "The map I saw is just like this one." He points out.

"What are you two talking about? This is obviously a consumer game." Itsuki tells them thinking they don't know what they are talking about.

Yuudai blurs their pointless conversation out. "So this is like a game nonetheless." Yuudai says to himself. "Meaning they are going to throw some starting adventurers at us before leaving."

"Doesn't this remind you of a game too?" Motoyasu questions catching Yuudai's attention.

Yuudai just shrugs. "If it does, I don't remember it." He replies. "It reminds me of an old book I was about to read though."

"A book?" Motoyasu asks sounding disappointed,

"Yeah and he's the shield too." Itsuki adds mockingly.

"Oh poor thing." The long haired blond says sarcastically.

Yuudai narrows his eyes on the two. "How about you two keep your mouths shut if you can't say anything useful." Yuudai tells them shocking the two. They didn't expect any kind of feedback let alone a spiteful one.

A loud knocking on the grand door behind them sounds. "Yes, come on in!" The king orders.

Yuudai and the other three turn to find the doors opening with many people in all kinds of armor and weapons. The adventurers that Yuudai knew would pop up soon. "Who are these people?" Itsuki asks the king.

"Adventurers that wish to travel with you all. The legendary heroes must embark on a journey to grow stronger. However, your weapons become ineffective if you travel together and therefore you must all take separate paths." The king explains to the heroes. A smile forms on his face giving Yuuda a bad feeling. "These people have already chosen who they wish to travel with. Choose your hero!"

Yuudai closes his eyes knowing the end result. His solo questing. He opens his eyes find find he is correct. Ren has five people, Itsuki has three and Motoyasu has four. Yuudai sighs uncaringly.

"To think it would come to this. The Shield Hero doesn't seem popular." The king says with a frown.

"It really doesn't matter." Yuudai tells the king. The king glares at him again. "I'll just beat enemies with a stick or something. That should be fun." The entire room stares at him in disbelief. The hero isn't upset? Any other person would be very upset.

Too bad for everyone else that they know nothing of his abilities. He already has a one up on the other heroes. Honestly, Yuudai doesn't really even need the shield. Once he gets a shot at some magic, the enemy is done for if it wasn't already.

"I suppose I will join him." The voice of a beautiful red haired girl volunteers.

"Damn it." Yuudai mutters comically.

"Doesn't your heart bleed thinking of him of him out there all alone." She asks rhetorically.

"Not really. Pretty sure the king would rather watch me burn for hours on end." Yuudai states having everyone ignore him.

"I'm Myne Suphia, Nice to meet you, hero!" She greets with a bright smile. Yuudai doesn't reply in favor for looking her over.

"Are you sure?" Motoyasu asks concerned for the girl he just lost to the Shield Hero.

"Yup!" She replies happily.

"She is way too cheerful." Yuudai mutters to himself. "Maybe I should keep myself from showing too much of my power."

"Now that's done, we shall furnish you all with your monthly allowance." The king announces. "The Shield Hero will have more this time around. Use it to recruit new members."

Yuudai waves his hand dismissively. "I'll try to remember that." He says irking the king.

"Now then heroes, be off on your journey!" The king orders holding his arm out.

The heroes all leave the castle after collecting their allowance. Yuudai looks himself over once outside seeing he is in the same clothes he word to Halkeginia. The green jacket, black undershirt, black pants and black shoes. He then thinks up the idea of getting some type of glove or something to cover his rune. It's not exactly normal. Knowing this, he puts his hands in his pockets.

Yuudai stops outside the castle gates looking at Myne. "So where is the armory around here?" Yuudai questions the girl.

His straightforward attitude towards her surprises her. She expected the personality of a lovestruck idiot. Instead, he is a guy with no intentions of trusting her yet. This might make her plan a bit complicated, but still workable.

She gives him a bright smile. "I'll show you."

She takes the lead showing him the way. While they walk, Yuudai notices that everyone is giving him weird looks. It seems like nobody at all cares for him.

"This totally doesn't make my job harder." Yuudai says sarcastically.

"What doesn't?" Myne asks turning her head to him.

He just shakes his head. "Don't worry about it." He tells her forcing a smile to his face. This girl...she gives off a bad vibe.

She shrugs it off. They continue to walk to the armory. After a few minutes, they arrive inside the armory. Yuudai looks around impressed by the different assortments of weapons, armor and the like. A bald man with a respectable black beard smiles at the two.

He focuses on Yuudai though. "Is this your first time here, customer?" He asks politely.

Yuudai smiles at the guy feeling as though he can easily trust him. "Yeah. I don't need a weapon, so could you see about getting the clothes on me armored up and a black cloak added on. Add some dark green combat gloves with that. Just make sure that each piece of clothing has a resistance to different magic." Yuudai requests knowing exactly what he wants.

Myne and the clerk stare at him gaping. He acts like he is a real hero. One prepared to save everyone while not wasting time.

"I could, but they wouldn't be done for a few hours. Considering this, what will you wear until then?" The man asks.

Yuudai puts his hand up to his chin in thought. "I could buy a bag and some extra light armor to wear until they are done." Yuudai suggests.

The man laughs heartily smiling wider at the teen. "I see our business is going to become friendship soon!" He says laughing.

Yuudai chuckles as well. "I'd hope so. Making an enemy out of a guy that is messing with your clothes would be a terrible idea. Plus, I need a friend in this world." Yuudai replies.

Myne stares at him in disbelief again. 'How am I supposed to frame him if he acts like this? It's like he know my plan!' Myne thinks in her mind.

"Well let's get all of this taken care of." The man says sorting through some light armor for him.

End

There is the end a well done chapter. What do you think? You think I can march on with this story? I think I could for a little while.

Anyway, those that are returning from one of my other "The Fear Of" series, thank you for trying this out. I'm still working on the others, it'll just take a while. Those that are new, welcome! There isn't much fanfiction of The Rising Of The Shield Hero, so I thought I could take a crack at it.

Without much else to say, thank you for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	2. False Accusations

You've been hit by! You've been struck by! My fist! Gotcha! Did you think you were going to be hit by a smooth criminal? Too bad! I'm a rough author!

Anyway, welcome back my friends. If you are unaware, you are all friends once you follow my story or favorite it! Even if you are just reading. Speaking of which, we got a couple favorites and a follow! Thank you very much!

I don't think there is much else to say except read on. (Just to let you know, updates will be random. I don't like schedules. Pressures me then I lose the urge to do the story.)

Chapter 2: False Accusations

A couple hours pass showing Myne and Yuudai walking outside with Yuudai's newly armored up clothes on. His cloak is on along with his combat gloves. He also has a bag with the extra clothing and a sleeping bag in it for himself. With everything he bought, he has about four hundred of his silver left out of his eight hundred he had originally.

The two are on their way to fight some monsters in the hills right now. Yuudai decided this as soon as they left the amory. He also bought her a bag with a sleeping bag in it. Nothing else though since she was already well equipped for fighting. She didn't seem too pleased with his decisions, but she never spoke up.

"So are you actually planning on camping outside?" Myne asks walking beside the black haired teen.

He looks at her deciding his bad feeling is warning him to just be weary of her. Therefore, until he finds something fishy going on with her actions, then he will be civilized with her. "Yes I do." He answers. "I know that it might be a bit colder than what you are used to, but I would rather save what silver I have left." He explains casually.

"That is very wise of you, hero." She compliments thinking that he is finally letting his guard down. He may not have gotten her much, but he isn't outright treating her as luggage anymore.

"Though if you think that it's too much, I'll give you some silver to go to the inn to sleep." Yuudai offers.

She smiles at him. "I'd be very grateful." He reaches in his bag to get a hand full of silver and hands it to her.

"That should be more than enough." Yuudai tells her never stopping his walk. They are now out in the fields.

His eyes catches sight of some monsters called an Orange Balloon. It shows the name in the corner of his vision as a game would. Yuudai smirks at the balloon creatures feeling as though they are slower than a snail.

The first few reach him making him finally react. He throws his fist at the first killing it right away. It pops just like a real balloon. Without another beat passing, he sucker punches another one making it pop. The other one makes it to him, but Yuudai allows this. Yuudai moves the shield in front of it having it slam into the shield.

Yuudai then catches it in his hand. "Kick ball is quite a popular game. Let's see if kick balloon is just as fun." He comments to nobody in particular. He drops the creature kicking it as it falls. It then flies into another two Orange Balloons killing them too. The other five slowly realize what they got themselves in too late. One moment later they are nothing but strips of balloon rubber on the ground.

After killing them all, his screen tells him he has just earned ten experience points. Yuudai is smiling to himself proud of his battle prowess still being good. Myne is once again staring at him shocked.

'He's supposed to be the Shield Hero! The weak one! The expendable one!' She thinks in her head freaking out.

Yuudai looks at the strips and his gem in the middle of his shield curiously. "I wonder…" He picks one up placing it in the gem. The gem absorbs it bringing up his status screen. However, the screen is filled with blank icons. In the middle is his basic shield. A new one opens up to show Orange Balloon Shield. "Cool." He says closing the screen.

"So...I don't suppose you would object to taking me back to Melromarc?" She underlyingly asks. She definitely needs to frame him. Especially now that they have a Shield Hero that can put up a fight.

Yuudai sighs. "Sure, but I actually want to level up first. We haven't even been out here for a few minutes. So you better get used to this. Otherwise you'll be very worn out by the end of our daily hunt. That's assuming you do anything." He states throwing some shade, underhanded jabs or insults, at her.

Two Hours Later In An Melromarc Inn

"So we were here in the fields today." Myne informs Yuudai on a map Yuudai had recently bought. She points at the fields they were recently at. Yuudai had gained three new levels there adding to his hp, defense and agility. "This map is pretty small, so it's not written out, but there is a town on the other side of this forest." She explains to him. "Outside that town is a perfect dungeon for leveling up once starting out."

Yuudai smiles at her genuinely this time. "Looks like we've got ourselves a plan. I can go through it and wallop some enemies then come out stronger. Though that might mean I wouldn't get such great items. I'll just have to hope that the treasure chests there have good items. That actually depends on if there are chests." Yuudai rants to himself. This is truly like a real game.

She pulls out a bottle of wine as Yuudai decides to fold the map and put it back in his bag. "Would you care for some wine?" She asks with a smile.

Yuudai rolls his eyes. "Last time I was around that crap, a friend of mine would have tried to sleep with me if I didn't send her away." Yuudai states jokingly talking about Siesta.

A dark grin forms in Myne's mind. 'I've got you now.'

"So that would be a hard pass." Yuudai tells her. A shiver runs down his spine warning him of incoming danger in the near future.

"Not even one glass?" She asks.

"Nope. Not until I find out wine can heal anything that ails me." Yuudai retorts. He then levels a solemn gaze on her. She tilts her head at this. "Listen...I've been kind of a jerk to you." Yuudai admits rubbing the back of his head. "I haven't even met you and assumed you'd try to stab me in the back. It's a harsh assumption, but it's just instinct to distrust someone when everyone already seems to dislike me."

'So he has noticed.' She thinks. She doesn't drop her deceiving smile. "It's no problem. I'd act the same way."

"Saying all that, I still don't trust you." He states causing her to face fault to the floor. "But know that I am grateful." He stands up walking up some stairs. "Goodnight Myne. Don't walk in my room or else I might mistake you for an intruder."

With that, he walks upstairs to his room he ordered. Once in, he closes the door frowning. He said all that for a reason. A little test of sorts. He looks around finding a lone window. Unfortunately it doesn't open.

"Well there goes that idea." He says sighing.

He was going to leave through the window to sleep in the fields, but it doesn't open. He'd simply speed out of the building without being seen with his insane speed, but that would definitely be noticed somehow. If by nothing else, someone will see or hear the door open and close.

Yuudai sits on his bed never taking his clothes off and laying his bag next to the bed. "This whole day has been interesting." He mutters. Yuudai looks around the plain room looking for somewhere to hide his bag. Yuudai stands up finding a whole in the middle of the box spring part. "Whoever stayed here last was a genius." The teen places the bag there then lays on the bed again. "Now to wait for her to try to steal something."

Next Morning

Yuudai is awoken by the kicking open of his door. He stands up getting in a combat stance only finding the royal guards standing there. The teen sighs dropping his stance.

"It's just you guys." Yuudai says raising his matress. He grabs the bag putting the strap over his shoulder. Yuudai looks at them seeing angry expressions on them. "What do you all want? I was sleeping."

One of them glares at him gritting his teeth. "You're under arrest under the accusation of rape!" The first guard tells him in a loud voice.

This puts Yuudai in a dark mood. He walks to the guard slowly and deliberately. The guard doesn't step back despite this. The two glare at each other.

"Who in the hell said this?" Yuudai questions feeling anger rise up in body.

"None of your damn business, rapist!" The guard yells at him.

Yuudai grabs the guard by the throat then slams him against the wall with a furious look on his face. "You better answer me or you underlings here are going to watch me beat you to a bloody pulp!" Yuudai yells at the guard seeing fear in the guard's eye.

Not even five minutes later, Yuudai is barging into the throne room without any guards around him. The entire throne room is staring at him with disgust, but there is curiosity as well. Where are the guards? Seeing this, a whole new group of guards surround Yuudai pointing sharp weapons at him. Though this doesn't phase him, he levels his gaze on Myne holding Motoyasu close to her.

"Where are the guards I sent after you?" The king demands to know.

"They are laying on the floor bloody and unconscious. Now it's your turn." Yuudai states pointing at Myne. "WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?!" Yuudai roars unnerving most people in the room. "I knew you'd betray me, but to accuse me of RAPE?! You're lucky I don't break every last bone in your body!"

Motoyasu steps in front of her glaring at Yuudai. "I won't let you near her! Not only do you lie and threaten her again, but you hurt the innocent guards sent after you! You're the worst!" The blond yells at him back.

Yuudai turns his rage to Motoyasu. "How about shutting your mouth?! Unless you are telling me that you two planned this false accusation together." Yuudai says.

"Earlier last night...he told me that he...that he took advantage of an old friend of his that was drunk." Myne adds faking tears falling down his face. "Then he got drunk later on...he came into my room...pushed me on the bed…" She trails off. She goes to say more, but something unexpected happen.

Yuudai's ring activates putting light blue streaks in his hair. As if he teleports, he appears in front of Myne and Motoyasu on the floor behind him. His face is riddled with boiling rage rising ever so quickly.

"You crossed a line lying like this, but lying about my old friend?" Yuudai clenches his fist.

"P-please don't hit me again!" Myne pleads sending people to murmur more.

"You'll be using that line with truth soon." Yuudai states.

"Back away from her, rapist!" Motoyasu shouts pointing the sharp point of his spear against the back of Yuudai's neck.

Yuudai whirls around quickly sucker punching the Spear Hero in the gut making him spit up some spittle. Motoyasu falls to his knees in pain as Yuudai looks over everyone in the room. "Anyone else want to have a go at me?" Yuudai questions angrily.

"You can't be a hero." Itsuki states giving him a disappointed look.

"To think you'd be granted such a role after everything you've done." Ren says looking disgusted.

"He must think he's above the law." Itsuki comments earning a nod from Ren.

Yuudai glares at the two putting the two on edge. "If I thought I was above the law, I would have killed Myne by now." He states causing everyone to gasp. The teen looks around the room finally placing his gaze on the king. "You and your kingdom can rot in the deepest parts of hell for all I care. Send me home."

The king places a hand against his face gritting his teeth. "Believe me, I'd love nothing more than to get rid of you. Regrettably, we can't even replace you without having all four of you die." The king informs him.

Yuudai flashes to the king instilling anger that a hero would dare get this close to him. "If I find out otherwise, I'll personally find the one able to send me back and have him send me back and leave you all to die." Yuudai tells the king.

Yuudai walks down the stairs glaring at every single soul in the room. "As punishment for all you have done is informing the public of what you've done." The king decrees.

Yuudai stops at the bottom. "So you're not going to attack me with more guards?" He asks darkly. He doesn't get a reply so he shakes his head. "Good. Until the wave comes, don't even bother thinking about me." Yuudai states walking out of the throne room while deactivating his power.

End

There is the end, right there! I finished this chapter the same day as the first chapter! Would you look at that? Pretty cool, huh?

I'm really feeling the energy for this story! It's pretty nice. I've also been reading up on the shield. Got some spoilers for later on, but oh well. I'd best be prepared, am I right?

Anyway, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	3. Meeting With Raphtalia

Hey hey hey, it's me! Again. Yup, the guy that writes this thing.

Anyway, how are you? I keep forgetting to explain in the chapters this story is based off the manga. If you see something different from the anime then either I did a thing or it's manga based.

Heads up, this chapter is a bit rough, I'll admit. If not then awesome! After all, the kind new friends of ours have come forth. Say hello everyone! Another heads up, the title kind of sucks this time. I couldn't think up a good one. It's odd. Either way, read on!

Chapter 3: Meeting With Raphtalia

Yuudai is now walking outside. He is angrily walking through the town glaring anyone down that thought that they would get in his way. At least, until the guy from the armory comes into sight.

"Hey Shield Boy!" The man calls out.

Yuudai walks over to him trying to calm himself. After all, he was the only nice one out of everyone. "What is it?" Yuudai asks.

"I heard about you. You tried to rape your friend and other things too." The guy states. "Let me punch you."

"I wouldn't ever call someone that lies about that kind of stuff a friend." Yuudai retorts. "Honestly, I thought that you would be able to see through such a lie."

"What did you say?!" The man exclaims grabbing the collar of Yuudai's shirt. The two glare at each other never breaking eye contact. The man sighs letting go of Yuudai. "You could have easily fought back against me...why didn't you?"

Yuudai keeps looking him in the eyes. "I won't hurt an innocent guy. I have morals. Though after this, it seems that I will have to reevaluate them." Yuudai replies.

He stares at the teen accepting this. "I don't know if you did all that or not for sure, but I can't see you doing that." He admits.

Yuudai's eyes become much more relieved. Finally, someone who isn't condemning him without any basis for doing so. "You're not wrong to want to be suspicious." Yuudai says adjusting the strap of his bag.

The man sighs rubbing his bald head. "Look, I won't assume anything, but did you really assault the guards and Spear Hero?" He asks.

Yuudai laughs a little bit good naturedly. "Absolutely! They all had it coming."

The man can't stop a small smile from creeping up on his lips. "I guess your limits only go to not molesting women."

Yuudai nods his head at that. "I'm sure I could find other things I wouldn't do." Yuudai states holding his hand out. The man takes hold of Yuudai's own hand shaking it. "Remember, my drastic actions always have a reason or two."

"I'll try to." He replies. A few minutes later, Yuudai is off into the darkening streets in a much better mood.

Moments later he is walking around the fields again. Seeing as he is much more calm and collected, he decides looking for herbs or something of the like would be the best idea. That way, on the off chance that he was hurt, he could create a potion. Or at least find someone who could.

"If that's the case then couldn't I just buy...that's going to be annoying." Yuudai says remembering that most people won't want to sell to him anymore.

He puts that thought aside in favor for searching for some herbs. After some time, he finds a lone tree being guarded by more Orange Balloon creatures. They take one look at the guy walking around fairly late and seem to to a lighter shade of orange. The teen raises an eyebrow watching them all run away.

One stays behind though. With its typical angry look, it launches itself at him. All he does is backhand the creature with his hand without the shield killing it.

"Is there anything that is going to be a challenge?" Yuudai questions walking to the tree. He looks down finding some medical herbs. The teen picks up the small pile in one hand. His shield starts to buzz.

Yuudai puts all but one of the leaves in his bag. Using the last one, he places it on the gem watching it fuse into the gem. Once again, his screen pops up showing he has now unlocked something call the Leaf Shield. Beside it says that collection skill is now plus one when being used.

"That will be useful later on." Yuudai states turning the screen off. He looks around the field not seeing any more Orange Balloons. "Seeing as it's late and I have no food, I should head to the town. I should have bought some food before leaving like I did." Yuudai sighs turning on his ring's power.

He makes it to the city easily. Not caring to be recognized, he pulls the hood of his cloak over his head. He deactivates his ring's power right away. Yuudai makes his way down the darkened streets to a random restaurant.

The teen walks to a table then sits down waiting for a waiter. One arrives soon taking his order while unaware of his identity. With it dark and his hood up, it isn't quite easy to make him out. Within an half hour he is eating some food. Too bad the waiter is the only one that isn't interested in him.

Three men with the look of thugs stalk on over to him. They stop behind Yuudai. "What's with that hood?" One of the thugs asks grinning.

Yuudai looks at the first thug acting bored. "Do you always interrupt people's dinner?" He asks ignoring their question.

"Hey, you're the so called Shield Hero." The second thug says growing a bigger grin.

"And you're annoying." Yuudai retorts taking another bite of his food.

That comment irks him, but the first thug holds a hand in front of him to keep him from doing something stupid. "We heard the Shield Hero has no companions, so how about you pay us to help you?"

Yuudai stands up facing towards the three. "If you heard of me then you should know that I don't have any respect for almost anyone in this kingdom." He gets closer to the first thug's face. "What makes you think I'm going to even give you and your two friends a single thought?"

The three pull out knives. The first presses his against Yuudai's neck. "You'll pay up seventy percent of what you earn. Do you understand?"

Yuudai looks to the other two thugs. "You two good with this?" He asks getting nods. "Then would you like your payment now?" All three nod again.

Yuudai quickly grabs the wrist of the first thug and twists his arm. Once twisted around once he brings up his elbow then down on his arm. A loud cracking sound emanates clearly as his knife drops to the ground. To keep his cry of pain from getting out, he puts his hand over his mouth.

"Before you two move a muscle, do you want him to die?" Yuudai asks slowly putting his other hand on the thug's head. The two don't move, but they are staring at him in shock. The first thug is far from shocked. He is scared to death. As he is sure he is going to be soon. "You see, I have just been threatened by three thugs. Now, your boss here is Steve now." Yuudai states. "Steve has put one of the knives that you happened to have against my neck. Why should I let you three go?"

Steve's pain and fear filled eyes look towards his other thug friends pleading for them to save him somehow. "W-we'll give you all of our silver coins we have!" The second thug offer searching his pockets for said silver.

"You could do that." Yuudai says nodding. He narrows his eyes on number two. "Or you two could bow to me and apologize for threatening me. I assume you'll want to hurry with this since Steve's other arm is looking like a twig right now."

"Do it already!" Steve orders muffled from Yuudai's hand over his mouth.

They both reluctantly bow to him. "We are very sorry, Shield Hero. We are only acting as we've been taught to." The two tell him at the same time.

Yuudai looks between the three in silence for a few seconds. Finally, he takes his hands off Steve. "Get out of my face." The teen orders sitting back down to eat.

Steve doesn't bother to pick up his knife. He runs away holding his arm being followed by his two friends. Yuudai finishes his food laying some silver on the table as payment for his food. He stands up seeing the waiter walking to him.

"I don't want you coming to my eatery again. No rapist is going to ruin my business." He states proceeding to walk away after that.

Yuudai rolls his eyes walking into the streets again. The teen walks down an alley after many disgusted looks from the public again. Yuudai stops looking to the ground. It is then that everything hits him.

"I thought heroes like me only had to deal with the hardships of loss. Not with the accusation of rape." He says to himself. He slumps against the wall thinking through his emotions. He takes thirty minutes thinking before finally sighing. "As much as the solo hero thing sounds workable, I need a partner. How to go about this though? I can't think of anyone that would want to travel with me."

"Seems I've arrived in time then." A shady voice says. Yuudai turns his head to a short and chubby man. He wears a big top hat with glasses that make it near impossible to see his eyes. "I hear you are looking for a companion."

Yuudai stands up straight. "I do. I'm assuming that you have respectable people?" Yuudai replies unable to see this guy as trustworthy.

The guy laughs at the notion. "I wouldn't suggest anything as fickle as people, per say." He says putting Yuudai on edge.

"What do you mean?" Yuudai questions.

"What I offer is something that can not lie or betray you." He starts. "You are the Shield Hero. Yes? Word travels fast. The hero who has attacked another hero and broken the arm of a thug." The guy goes on. He flashes his teeth smirking when silence answers him. "I think you might find appreciation in what I offer, Shield Hero."

Yuudai nods slowly. He follows him without another word to a big tent. The short man allows him in not able to see Yuudai's eyes widen in shock. The entire place is filled with cages holding all kinds of creatures. The teen shakes off the look of shock.

"That's what you meant. Offering me a slave." Yuudai concludes trying his best not to break. The only good thing is the fact he sees no humans in the place.

"That's correct. I have many demi-humans. They are extremely convenient." The trader tells Yuudai.

"Then show me the cheap ones." Yuudai hurriedly requests of him. "I don't care about seeing something I can't afford." But the other reason is that he wants to leave as quick as possible. He might have said he'd rethink his morals, but this is stretching it.

The trader shrugs still grinning. "As you wish." The two continue walking until they reach a section closed off with only fabric. "What are you looking for, exactly?"

Yuudai takes one good sniff immediately covering his nose. "Preferably something not dead." The teen answers. The trader chuckle walking through along with Yuudai. "I guess it doesn't matter. As you know, I fight just fine. I wouldn't complain if they could fight though."

"So you're not looking for a girl? From what I heard…" The trader takes one look at Yuudai finding him glaring at him.

"If you are implying that I raped that girl then you are mistaken." Yuudai tells him firmly.

"Right right. I was wrongly informed then." The two continue walking around looking for something that'd catch his interest.

Some coughs come stand out from the surrounding noise. This catches Yuudai's attention feeling his hand buzz. He looks to his rune containing his shadowgun finding that it is glowing underneath his combat glove. The black haired teen walks over to the cage moving a blanket revealing a little girl with long red hair.

The little girl looks up to him with wide eyes. His hand stops buzzing telling him this is the cause of it. She stares at him as if she feels something as well. What surprises him is the raccoon ears on her head. It is the first time he has seen the like. Usually it's the cat or fox girls.

Yuudai gets on one knee to look into her eyes. "What is your name?" He asks gently.

"Ra...Raph...Raphtalia." She answers having trouble speaking. Hearing her sends a fire through him. She is not okay. She seems to be very ill.

She and him stare into each others eyes for some time. "Should I consider her sold then?" The trader asks having already asked him over and over if this was his decision.

Yuudai restrains his urge to knock the guy out for speaking of her as some kind of item, but reminds himself that the girl is only an item to the guy. Why would he think any differently of her when he's surrounded by 'items'? As disgusting as the entire idea is, he holds back.

"Yes. I'll take her." Yuudai replies. The trader leads them into a small room once unlocking her cage.

He places her on the other side of the room (The slave trader's name is now Trader until I learn otherwise). Trader pulls out a knife never dropping his grin. "I require your blood." He states without any small talk.

Yuudai nods holding his hand out. Trader cuts his finger open letting some blood drip in a cup. Trader draws the slave symbol on her chest. Once the drawing is done a shockwave goes through her making her scream in pain. Yuudai wants nothing more than to help right now, but once again refrains since he can't do anything right now.

"Now this slave...is yours." Trader tells the teen hero.

"Thank you." Yuudai thanks not feeling thankful at all. He grabs hold of her hand feeling a wave of familiarity rush through him. Like a sibling would feel after not feeling the touch of their other sibling in years. He walks her out never wanting to return there again.

End

Welcome to the end notes everyone! I'm surprised you made it! Kind of.

The reason being that the third chapter felt kind of rough. I'm trying to have Yuudai go through the dark things, but Yuudai just doesn't back down or stay down. He just doesn't. Anyway, I hope you liked what this chapter offered.

Second thing. The buzzing of Yuudai's rune. I have a plan for Yuudai and Raphtalia. I'm not sure what yet, but that's the fun of writing. Never knowing what's next even myself.

If you have an interesting idea then say something! I may not include it, but I always consider ideas that have potential. Without much more pointless rambling, thank you for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	4. Preparing Raphtalia

What is up in this...unspecified area? If I still offended you then holy crap, I accomplished the unintentional. Praise me!

Anyway, I have some news. I'm going by the light novel now. As I learned from the familiar of zero, it is a bit nicer to do it that way. On another note, we have much more friends with us! Even our first three review! Let's answer them, shall we?

Kaijin36: Thank you. I look forward to your reading.

Boomburst: Ah yes...much more!

Zenimaster24: Welcome to my other story! I'm glad to see someone from the original take a crack at this. I know, you have no idea how much I wanted to have him break her. Luckily, there is other times they meet. You know, when they aren't in the city or more importantly when she tries to get rid of Raphtalia. Yeah, but as time goes on, Yuudai will eventually see his girls from him as rescued girls. Probably. Thanks for the info, I really needed it. That's actually a good idea, the Raphtalia being a gunslinger and swordsman. From that, I have an idea. And yes, the gun is real in a new world, so I'm going to tweak it a bit. By a bit, I mean the different types. With the answer that leaves questions, I'll let you read on.

Guest: Wait no longer! Until the next chapter...

Now that we got our lovely friends answered, let's get this story on the road!

Chapter 3: Preparing Raphtalia

"Hey Baldy." Yuudai greets walking into the armory with Raphtalia by his side. Her face is filled with fear and paranoia.

The bald man, Elhart (Thank you Zln), frowns at the boy. "Calling me that alone should give me more than enough reason to throw you out." He states standing up straight. "What can I do for you, Shield Boy?"

"Well I have a new partner with me and she needs some good armored clothes and a weapon." Yuudai answers patting Raphtalia's head.

"I think I can do that. What's your plan though? I can't imagine you are going to stick around this town much longer." He says laying down a short sword and looking for something to fit her.

"You hit that on the mark." Yuudai comments rubbing his head. "The plan is to get Raphtalia in fighting shape and then head to a dungeon that can actually challenge me."

Elhart hands her a pair of clothes allowing her into a private room to change. "Which first?"

Yuudai shrugs. "Don't know. Probably the dungeon so that she can get leveled up quickly." He says. "Besides, it's not like I can't protect her if I need to. I've got power, speed and defense like a boss."

"But since she can actually wield weapons she will be very helpful." Elhart adds making Yuudai realize that fact.

"Just between the two of us, I kind of thought I could get through this hero job by punching things." Yuudai admits laughing nervously. This brings Elhart to laugh as well.

"E-excuse me, master." Raphtalia interrupts quietly. Elhart and Yuudai look to her walking out in her new clothes. Her short sword is at her waist adding to the 'don't screw with this girl' vibe she's giving off. To be fair though, Yuudai is giving off that vibe than she is.

"First off, not your master. I am simply Yuudai to you." He explains to her. The teen looks to Elhart for a moment. "I think I'm going to stick around here until she isn't sick, doesn't accept racial crap like that and can fight."

"You've got your work cut out for you then." The bald man says laying a hand on his shoulder.

Raphtalia looks at her master curiously hearing that. This teen has only created question after question for her. For example, on her hand is an odd rune. If one was to look at it they would say it looks like Yuudai's own. It appeared there slowly after they left the slave trader's place. She hasn't said anything yet, but she has no doubt he'll see it soon.

"Though I have to ask. Why did you get a slave? This isn't exactly going to help plead your innocence." Elhart reasons leaning against his desk.

Yuudai frowns thinking back to all those creatures. Most were sick or monstrous. "I couldn't leave her there. I'd have been a way worse person if I left her." Right after his words more pained coughs come from her making Yuudai and Elhart cringe.

"You are a good guy, but you get yourself in horrible situations." Elhart states.

Yuudai once again nods agreeing with the man. He puts down some silver to pay for the equipment for Raphtalia. "As much fun as it always is being here, I must be going."

"Just don't die. You're the most intelligent I have." Elhart admits.

"It can't be too hard to manage." Yuudai replies letting laughs out of both sides. "Follow me Talia." He instructs her.

She follows him outside looking up at him. "I...call me...Raphtalia. Please." She requests shyly. She closes her eyes thinking she's going to be hit for speaking out. The hit never comes. Her eyes open to Yuudai crouching in front of her. He is looking her in the eyes.

"If that's what you want then alright." Yuudai relents holding his hand out for her.

Raphtalia grows a bright smile for the first time in forever. Ever since her parents were killed. She throws out that thought in favor for grabbing his hand. The two then walk around the city while Raphtalia looks around amazed at all the shops. The whole city amazed her.

As they reach the gate a sudden noise stops them. Her stomach growled. He looks at her questioningly. She tries to reject her hunger, but Yuudai doesn't.

Without a word, he turns around holding her hand still. He leads her to a cheap restaurant he hasn't been to yet. The waitress leads them to their seat apparently not recognizing him. That's a first.

Yuudai eyes his new companion staring at a kids meal across the restaurant. He smirks knowing what to order. The waitress seats them a second later.

"I'll have a the cheapest meal you have and she'll have what the kid over there is having." Yuudai orders smiling at the shocked speechless Raphtalia.

"Very well, sir. That'll be nine bronze." She tells him. He hands her one silver getting back the exact change. She then takes her leave to prepare the order.

"I hope that any thug around has heard about Steve. That way they leave me alone." Yuudai mutters looking around. This comment from him stems from not wanting to let the people's talk about him around the room. Not a single one is good. Not that he's done any good.

"Why?" Raphtalia asks him. He looks at her raising an eyebrow. "Why are you being so nice?"

Yuudai leans closer to her watching her stiffen. "Why wouldn't I?" He asks acting like it is normal to feed someone. "Between the two of us, I know the feeling of being a slave of sorts."

Her eyes widen. "Really?! Was your master mean?"

His thoughts roam back to his days in Halkeginia. Thinking of the good times. Then the times with Louise. The next thing he remembers a certain situation she put him in while under the effects of a love potion.

"Very mean. Tried to stop me from eating as punishment." He tells her thinking of the bad things to get weird of the pervy thing from his head.

"What did you do?" Raphtalia asks with sparkles in her eyes.

"Since me and her had many difference in opinions beforehand, I did what I always did. What I felt like. I snuck in and had my share of food." He answers feeling a twinge of excitement from talking with someone trustworthy for once.

"Really?" She asks again in disbelief. "She didn't punish you more?"

Yuudai chuckles. "She couldn't really punish me. I was simply too quick for her." He tells her. "She couldn't use the shock thing since our bond was a bit different than ours." He points between the two of them.

The two continue to pass the time with small talk from there. It feels strange for the girl, but it also feels natural. As if she has been around him her whole life. He even treated her as a friend. Not something demi-humans experience very often.

The waitress brings out their food eventually bringing it to the table. She sets a plate of bacon in front of Yuudai and the other meal in front of Raphtalia. She looks at Yuudai for permission to eat seeing him gesture for her to do so. The racoon girl doesn't waste another moment.

She begins to chow down on her food with her bare hands. The black haired teen sighs making it a point to add table manners to the list of things to teach her. He starts eating his bacon thinking about the long list that is only growing that is keeping him in that town. At this point it's either stay and teach or teach while putting her in danger out in the wild.

Yuudai throughs that idea out the window immediately. Not only is she level one, but she has much to learn in fighting. She is like family now. He can't throw her headfirst into the danger he intends to fight.

"By the way, first verbal lesson. If anyone by the name of Motoyasu or Myne tries to talk to you, slap them. Slap them hard and walk away afterwards." Yuudai tells her offhandedly. "Or punch Yasu in the groin. That'd be fun to see."

She tilts her head at him. "Why?"

"They both are two of the scum that plague this land. I'd have killed them myself already if I didn't think there would be severe consequences that even I would have a troublesome time dealing with." He replies dropping the stressful thoughts in his head.

She gives him a thumbs up. She grabs the rest of her food gulping it all down. Yuudai finishes his own in a few bites. The teen stands up as well as Raphtalia.

"Let's get going then, Raphtalia." Yuudai says walking out. She follows after him.

Raphtalia starts to hum a merry tune on their way to the fields. It catches Yuudai's interest. She's humming a pretty good tune. The hero hums in harmony with her within the next few seconds.

Moments later they are standing in the fields. Raphtalia is feeling fairly nervous seeing Yuudai serious for the first time since their meeting. She looks up to him twiddling her thumbs.

"I am always going to be here for you no matter what from now on." Yuudai tells her. "However, I want you to be able to have my back as well as be a capable fighter on your own."

"Y-you mean…" She trails off fearfully. "Kill things?"

"No. There will be times that will be necessary, like with these wild creatures, but fighting is simply a means of protection." Yuudai explains to her. "I've killed many times. Human beings even."

Her eyes widen in fear at those words. Her master that she has been feeling so much warmth from is a killer. Of his own kind to boot.

"The reason was because they wanted me and Blanc dead. It was kill or be killed. No way was I going to sit and accept death. Neither will you." Yuudai tells her now looking around for an Orange Balloon.

"B-but I don't want to kill anything!" Raphtalia exclaims.

"Let's make a compromise." Yuudai offers. "You must kill anything that tries to kill you or harm you, but if it happens to be another demi-human or human then you don't have to. I expect you beat them to an inch of their life, but you don't have to kill them."

Her eyes still don't lose the fear. "It's still life though."

"You won't get out of this Raphtalia. I'm nice, but you are going to grow stronger. Like it or not." Yuudai states leaving no room for argument.

She looks to the ground. "What if I die?" She asks. Another spout of coughing escapes her throat again.

Yuudai sighs feeling like a older sibling or parent of a little girl. Considering she is, he just has to accept it. "You and I will fight together. That will allow me to find some medical herbs so that I can get that cough cured." The black haired teen keeps walking past the field confusing Raphtalia.

"I thought we were going to the field." She says following him.

Yuudai picks up a couple medical herbs from the ground then returns his focus on her. "Well that was the plan until I remembered that there is a dungeon near the next town over. I heard it was perfect for beginners."

"Please don't let me die..." She pleads.

"Don't worry, Raphtalia. If you die then I'll have to have been killed already." Yuudai assures her smiling.

She embraces him, up to his waist, trying to find comfort. "Do I have to kill?"

"It's part of life. Or at least the life we live in." Yuudai replies looking to the forest now in sight.

End

There we go! The next chapter of the surprisingly noticed fanfic I'm writing. I've also noticed a few of you are reading my other Fear Of stories. Thanks! That'll help understand Yuudai.

So I gave the two the relationship that they deserve. A good one. While Naofumi may be what a realistic guy would be, Yuudai is different. He has been through a lot. He wouldn't condemn the entire world for one kingdom's mistake.

Also heard about the two deaths of Myne. I so hope to write that far. I plan to give Yuudai his payback around that time. Probably around the second death. Oh wait, I should have put spoiler alert for this paragraph...spoiler alert this paragraph.

Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	5. The Forest

Once upon a time, there was a lone writer. He thought people really loved his stories. He went on to write best selling books. Then he woke up to find he writes fanfiction. Moral of the story? Dreaming is awesome.

More friends! MORE! We have MORE! Let's answer some of their reviews.

ThelonewolfNT: Thank you!

Chapter 5: The Forest

"Another bites the dust it seems." Yuudai says offhandedly. His screen flashes briefly telling him Raphtalia just leveled up again. To level three.

Raphtalia has been ordered to kill any Orange Balloon in sight by Yuudai. That was when they started walking into the forest. They are already almost halfway through. She reluctantly killed the creatures, but didn't let herself regret it.

"When will I get to see you fight them?" Raphtalia asks no longer feeling the requirement to act like he is a slave owner. One person to another.

Yuudai changes his shield into the leaf shield once seeing another medical herb. He picks it up earning twice as much. The teen is still quite confused at the sudden addition out of nowhere, but shakes it away. He looks back at her.

"You mean you haven't seen me attacking the Orange Balloons that were behind you?" He asks seeing his level now eight. She quickly turns on her heels to find several remains of Orange Balloons behind her. "You're welcome."

She turns back to him with her eyes sparkling. "What are you, Yuudai?" She asks excitedly.

"Well I've been many things. As of now, I am the Shield Hero." Yuudai replies nonchalantly.

"You mean one of the four holy things?" She questions. It seems that she is now more curious than ever.

"Yup. Remember Yasu?" He asks back. Raphtalia nods in answer. "That is the Spear Hero."

"What?!" Raphtalia asks in surprise. "The Spear Hero stabbed you in the back?"

"Him and his dumb broad." Yuudai answers trying to think of any insult to describe her.

The two grow silent continuing their trek. In truth, if Yuudai felt like it, he would already be at the dungeon at that exact moment. He just wants to enjoy the journey. That and the fact Raphtalia isn't anywhere close to his max speed. Even he doesn't know exactly how fast that is. He never attempted full speed.

They slowly come upon a few new creatures. Yuudai deadpans at the mushroom looking creatures. His little screen tells him three are Loomush. They are as tall as an average human. While they resemble mushrooms, they have the color scheme of white. Beside them are one Bluemush and Greenmush each. About five in all.

Yuudai walks up to one of the Loomush without it noticing until too late. He jumps up landing an axe kick on its head. It crushes in on itself becoming something resembling a white pancake. The other four creatures look to him apparently startled.

"Alright Raphtalia. You take the two white ones and I'll take Blue and Green here." Yuudai orders never looking to her to make sure she is cooperating.

Yuudai watches the blue and green creatures kind of jump towards him slowly. To him they are as slow as any Orange Balloon or even slower. Getting bored, he runs towards the green one deciding to use a move he hasn't used in a fight yet.

He swings his leg at the Greenmush in an inside crescent kick dazing the thing. He then swings around the rest of the way hitting it with a right hook. Following this is his tornado of kicks and punches. The moment he finally stops is when it drops dead. Not to say it just died. It just now had the chance to fall.

Yuudai shoots his gaze at the Bluemush now. It seems to pale, kind of like the Orange Balloons did, from his gaze. Before it can react, the teen is already in front of it throwing a side kick at where its head would be on a human. The Bluemush is sent crashing into a tree from the force of his kick. He walks to it finding that it is already dead too.

"Time to take a bit of each." Yuudai says walking around taking some of the remains of each Mush. He adds them into his gem on his shield.

His shield screen shows up on his screen showing him three new shields are unlocked. The Mush Shield, Blue Mush Shield and the Green Mush Shield. Each of the shields having different equip effects. The Mush Shield simply adds one point to plant appraisal. The Blue Mush Shield adds one to simple recipe and the Green Mush Shield adds one to apprenticeship compounding.

"So kind of pointless things at the moment. Except the blue one." He says turning the screen off. He looks over to check on Raphtalia seeing her finishing off the second Loomush. The experience points add up. She has just leveled up to level four. "Good job, Raphtalia."

"Thank you." Raphtalia thanks panting slightly from the amount of work he's been putting her through.

He listens intently hearing the sound of a river nearby. "There is a river nearby. We can rest up there." He informs her.

She laughs confusing him. "You just now noticed?" She asks teasingly.

At that moment he seems to remember she is demi-human with raccoon ears. She probably heard it a good distance back. "Are you saying you'd like to continue past the river without break?" He teases back.

She straightens up immediately shaking her head frantically. "No no no!"

He laughs much to her playful annoyance. The duo start to walk again towards the river. They reach in not even two minutes later.

"Go wash up in the water for a bit." Yuudai tells his young companion.

She tilts her head towards him. "What about you?"

"I'm going to try mixing some of these medical herbs and mushrooms to see what works." Yuudai answer pulling out some logs from his bag. "After I build a fire."

She nods smiling. Raphtalia then undresses getting into the water. This leaves Yuudai to his devices. The teen starts on his own job. He lights the logs using the sparks from some rocks like he learned some time back in his original world.

He then starts mixing the herbs and mushrooms with his two rocks he got the sparks from. After many tries of trial and error, he ends ups with about ten normal potions. Its quality is fair and is effective on weak colds. The rest was black dust on the ground.

"Why the hell is nobody questioning this?" Yuudai asks about the vials of liquid that came from his creation of the potions. His questioning is about the liquid in the vials that just replaced the ingredients out nowhere. This world is more like a game than ever.

He allows his shield to absorb one of the recipes creating a new shield. The Small Medicine Shield and the Small Poison Shield. The Medicine Shield makes medicine efficiency go up while the Poison Shield ups his poison resistance. They are both fairly useful.

Raphtalia walks over from the water causing him to look away with a blush. "I refuse to look at a nude little girl!" He exclaims making himself feel weird. He pulls out a towel from his bag and tosses it to her. "Please dry off and put clothes on."

While she does this, Yuudai walks to the edge of the water picking up a sharp stick. He uses it to spear a couple fish through. The teen returns to the fire putting the fish over the fire. Raphtalia joins him sitting by the fire by his side.

"Here is some medicine. It might help with your coughing." He tells her handing her a vial. She coughs again further showing the need for it.

"Thank you." She thanks again drinking it all down.

He smiles at her noticing a familiar symbol on her hand. His smile falls into a straight face. "Focus on your hand and push all your energy out that hand with the symbol." Yuudai intructs surprising Raphtalia.

"Y-you know what it is?" She asks surprised to hear him talking about it.

The hero nods pulling off his combat glove. It shows his own mark of the shadow gun. She stares at it shocked now. Her master had the same exact mark! "Please do it." He repeats.

She wordlessly complies. Much to her further surprise, her symbol pushes out an exact replica of Yuudai's own shadow gun. The difference lays in the fact that her name seems to be engraved in the side of it.

Yuudai observes the gun looking for other differences. The wind mark that is on the side of his isn't there, but the reason for that is that he owns Wales' ring. That is what gives him the speed boost or the wind magic that comes from it that is the cause of the speed boost.

"Pull the trigger." Yuudai tells her pointing to the trigger of the gun. "Point it at that Orange Balloon." He points to the creature across the river.

She nods pointing the weapon at it. Raphtalia pulls the trigger shooting off a brown colored bullet. Once it impacts the creature she disappears from sight. The creature is pushed to the side as Raphtalia reappears where it was.

The demi-human is frantically looking around. Yuudai's eyes widen surprised. He wastes no time in jumping across the lake in one jump using the power of the ring. His blue streaked hair surprises Raphtalia even more causing her to drop her guard. Not even a second later he is beside her with his foot on top of Orange Balloon remain.

"W-what happened?" Raphtalia asks scared.

He points to the ground where she was sitting a moment ago. "Shoot."

She reluctantly nods. The raccoon girl shoots again at the area teleporting there. He jumps across the lake turning off his ring's power. Yuudai then sits on the ground in front of the fire take the fish off the fire. The fish seem to be done cooking.

She sits beside him again as her gun returns to its rune while taking one of the fish from him. She doesn't start eating though. "What was that?" She asks again.

Yuudai takes a bite out of his cooked fish. "It seems that your shadow gun is different." He states not really answering her question. "When you shoot yours, you teleport to the area that your bullet hits. I'm quite intrigued. We'll have to experiment with it."

"What about your...transformation?" She questions.

"It's the result of the power of my ring." Yuudai explains. He returns his glove onto his bare hand. "He gave it to me a day or two before his death." His voice to a more somber tone once he admitted his friend's passing.

She looks to the ground sadly. "I...I'm sorry for asking."

"Don't worry about it. I trust you with my past. Just don't insult my old friends." He tells her.

A half hour passes showing Raphtalia looking drowsy. Yuudai stays silent watching her eyes slowly close. Soft snores start coming from her. Her head is now laying Yuudai's shoulder.

Yuudai smiles at the feeling of her head on his shoulder. How long has it been since a friendly person has even touched him. He honestly can't even remember. Good things don't always last though.

"No...no...help!" Raphtalia cries out softly at first. Yuudai knows what is going on. She's having a nightmare. "No! No!" She then screams making his ears ring.

He grabs hold of her in a hug. His mind is telling him to comfort her through contact. The idea of waking her up isn't exactly a pleasing one. It would simply start all over again.

After her screams finally stop, he sees an Orange Balloon come in sight. It spots him grinning in its odd way. Yuudai reaches for a rock next to him tossing it up and down. He then throws it in a straight line nailing the creature in its center making it pop.

He continues to hold her through the night. The whole night passes without anymore nightmares making her scream. It seems it has something to do with her parents. During the night she had whimpered about them.

Next Morning

Raphtalia yawns as she awakens. "Welcome to the land of the suffering or as I like to call it, land of the living." Yuudai greets looking very sleepy.

She tilts her head questioningly. 'Why is he so close?' She wonders then notices that he is holding her close. The demi-human blushes, but doesn't go to move away.

"We'll head back to the town today." He tells her sleepily.

"Why? Weren't we heading to the next town over?" She asks not tired anymore.

"Because I know how to create potions. Knowing that I can do it without the proper tools means that getting the actual tools could be very useful." Yuudai answers having thought about this all night.

"What about hating the city?" She questions.

"I also realized hating the city is too much work. I'll just hate the people. It's easier." Yuudai answers again.

"Do you need to sleep?" She once again asks.

"You have no idea." He replies. The teen looks around the area. The area is clear of enemies. "Please keep watch while I take a nap."

She nods watching him close his eyes. To say the least, he did not wake up that day. He slept through it. She fell asleep with him when that night hit too.

End

That's another chapter finished. How was it? I hope it was good! It'd be a shame if it wasn't.

So there is Raphtalia's shadow gun ability. I figured that maybe I should change it up since it'd be boring to see the same thing Yuudai has. Plus she could use it more.

Without much else to think of, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	6. Speeding Through The Forest

Come one, come all! To the main event! We will be showing you all kinds of stuff today! Like how to write stuff...or read stuff...I don't have much else to offer. Except many more favoriters and followers. Thank you all! You all are awesome! Now to the reviews.

OechsnerC: Thank you very much! I do my best. And thank you for checking out the other The Fear Of stories!

Zinmaster24: I'm glad you're enjoying this. It warms my heart. And you are right. The gun would be a rule violation. It'd be interesting what kind of shields could be made if the gun could become one with the shield...wouldn't it? Wonder how he'll respond to that. I've pondered on that. It's only a matter of which weapon and how. He is different, but that is the reason for his drastic rise in level. The wave may be very soon with the time skip I did. Mostly because of the otherwise uneventful things that happen in between. I know, I've noticed these things after I upload chapters. Since I am the only one working on this I often overlook some things. I'll probably go back and fix those errors soon. Probably once this chapter is up. Sorry for the length of this reply, it is just a lot to respond to. Honestly, love it. Love the honesty.

Chapter 6: Speeding Through The Forest

Two and a half weeks passes with the two preparing for more traveling. They have been leveling up, buying and selling items to the town stores when they come back to the city. Yuudai has been putting off going to that dungeon for a while now. It seems to keep slipping his mind.

"This should be it." Yuudai states feeling his bag getting a small bit heavier. That would be the cause of all the food, camping supplies and extra clothing for when he is cleaning his main clothing.

"Want to double check? Just in case?" Raphtalia asks causing him to look over to her.

She is level seventeen and he is twenty five now. He has noticed her body is now looking like a seventeen year old now as well. It confused him for a while, but eventually assumed her body grows with her level. The teen boy nods looking through his bag again.

"Mind if I mess around for a little bit?" Raphtalia asks. He looks at the ball made of Orange Balloon remains he made for her about two weeks ago. Yuudai caught her watching other childeren playing with a similar ball.

He looks into the sky towards the sky judging the time. It's about mid-day. "Sure. You can screw around for an hour or so." Yuudai replies tossing her the ball.

She catches the ball rolling her eyes at him. "Of course." She says with amusement in her eye. She walks off with the ball making sure not to go too far.

The teen smiles at her. Such lively nature in a girl that has been through so much. You could hardly tell she was a slave anymore. She looks like a regular girl with raccoon features.

"I thought I'd find you here." A lone female voice says.

Yuudai's teeth grate against each other. He slowly turns around finding Motoyasu, Myne and two more followers of his. Seeing the group sets his anger off, but not in a normal way. Into that calm rage.

"What would a playboy and his personal princess want?" Yuudai questions seeing Motoyasu raise an eyebrow.

Myne laughs at this holding one of her hands in front of her mouth. "What brings you to say that?" She asks smirking like she always does.

"I'd have to be a total idiot not to see it." Yuudai retorts. "Now what sort of curse would bring you to find me? I can't imagine it's worth the result."

Motoyasu steps closer not looking happy with with him. "Don't speak to her like that!" He orders him. Motoyasu sets an unfaltering gaze on him. "I heard you have done some horrible stuff recently. Just give up all your silver and we'll take it as the debt."

A laugh comes from Yuudai. An honest laugh. "You really think I'm going to give you people money for anything." Yuudai says thinking up a fun idea. "Alright. That only sounds fair."

Myne's face takes a look of confusion. She thought he would defy them again. The king's daughter observes him pull out a good sized sack of coins. It's the size of a baseball and packed to the brim.

"Think fast." Yuudai tells him throwing the sack at Motoyasu's groin. Every guy in a mile radius suddenly grasps their groin in pain. The universal notification of an assault on the male anatomy.

Yuudai uses his speed to take it back before it hits the ground then returns to his original spot. The poor blond falls to the ground holding his privates shaking in pain. He smiles at the rest of the group as a crowd gathers.

"If this is all you idiots wanted me for then you've just wasted my time." Yuudai states turning around to walk away. "Especially when I already ordered you not to."

"Wait just a minute! How dare you attack the Spear Hero!" Myne demands incredulously. "He asked of you a simple request!" Her goal is to make him worse than he is already. "Such a barbarian!"

Yuudai turns on his heels walking towards her now. "Since everyone already hates me, I don't have a problem with shutting your mouth." Yuudai pulls back his fist and punches Myne square in the nose creating a very audible crack. The force of the punch sends her skidding on her back for a few yards. She holds her nose in an attempt to stop the bleeding that is now starting. "Tell your daddy to suck it."

With that, Yuudai leaves. He walks towards the crowd watching them part. On the other side is Raphtalia standing above three bleeding teenage boys. They are bleeding from the mouth and nose.

He raises an eyebrow at her. "They were being racist jerks." Raphtalia tells him crossing her arms.

He pats her head not surprising Raphtalia. After all, he's the one that taught her to never take that racist crap from anyone. "We have to be leaving. I just broke the king's daughter's nose and assaulted Yasu's groin with a sack of silver coins."

"That explains why people are yelling at you to leave." Raphtalia says looking at the crowd. They are yelling at them to leave sprinkled with countless other insults.

"It's stupid since the wave is barely a week away." Yuudai says walking off with her. She hums in agreement. "We are heading to the other village now."

She looks at him doubtfully. "Sorry to doubt, but you've said that before."

"Every time we left for it, we always needed something from this stupid city." Yuudai replies sighing. "This time I don't plan on being slow. Before we leave, let's visit our buddy, Elhart."

She smiles at him nodding. "It's been a while since we've seen him." She says happily.

The two walk to the armory quickly. Once in, they find Elhart setting down a custom shield. Custom ordered by Yuudai. Yuudai smiles at the shield. It is a medium sized circular shield with a double edged blade coming out in one direction. The blade itself is as long as a longsword.

"What is this?" Raphtalia asks looking over the weaponized shield.

"This is a beauty I had Elhart start on making over a week ago." Yuudai answer his young companion.

"You mean it's the most annoying thing I've ever had the displeasure in making." Elhart complains. He smirks despite his annoyance. "It is very self-satisfying to know I made it though."

Yuudai's shield buzzes again telling him it can be copied. He already knew this though. Every time he has found a shield or item it started buzzing. Thinking through this during those sleepless nights got him to try out an idea.

He presses the shield against the new shield watching his screen pop up again. A new bubble appears in the giant stock of locked shields. The Sword Shield along with all of its color variations.

He transforms the shield into the new one surprising the two watchers. "Such an amazing shield." Yuudai admires. He pulls out the coin bag of his and dumps half of it on the counter in front of Elhart. "That should be enough to cover the materials used."

Elhart nods scooping the silver coins into his own little bag. "That it is. What else can I help you with?"

Yuudai hums thinking of anything else. "Nothing that I can think of." He begins to walk out the door having Raphtalia follow.

She gives the bald man a big smile. "Have a good day!" She says following after her master.

"Grab onto me, Raphtalia." Yuudai tells her. Raphtalia tilts her head curious of what the purpose is. "Do it. I plan on being there within five minutes or less."

The raccoon girl's eyes stare at him in disbelief. "How? That's impossible." She says as if it's a proven fact.

Yuudai's shield returns to normal as he deadpans at her. "After all you've seen of me...you think that is impossible?"

She sweat drops realizing the truth in that. "How do you plan on doing it though?"

Yuudai activates his ring's power streaking his hair with light blue. "Hold on to find out." He repeats.

She finally decides to cooperate. Raphtalia wraps her arms around his neck from behind. "So what now?"

Yuudai smirks taking off. To Raphtalia, nothing can be made out. The world is blurring by at an impossible pace. She closes her eyes feeling her them start to water.

Yuudai casually looks around the surroundings go by like usual. He has gone back and forth from the forest and mountains to the city in the same manner many times. This time he just has to keep going past the river.

He switches to his new shield catching sight of ten Loomush in one spot. The teen cuts them all in half without any effort while continuing on. The experience point add up between the two giving him the majority. Only a few more before he can level up again.

Yuudai sees the river jumping over it with ease. He lands on the other side stopping there. The reason for the stop is to check on Raphtalia. Her hold on his loosens letting her fall to the ground.

Yuudai looks turns around to look at her, but regrets it. She is throwing up into the river. He averts his gaze not wanting to see her lunch a second time.

"So I take it that you don't like that speed?" Yuudai asks slowly.

"How do you stand going that fast?!" She exclaims after throwing up.

Yuudai only shrugs. "It's natural for me. The world around me is slow and smaller when I decide to use my ring's power." He replies. In truth, he can't really describe it.

He picks her up bridal style causing her to blush. "W-what are you doing?" Raphtalia questions. "Do we have to run the rest of the way?"

Yuudai only gives her a smile. It doesn't comfort her one bit. He starts the speed trip up again while she closes her eyes. The trip stops about ten seconds later.

"What happened here?" Yuudai questions holding anger in his voice.

Raphtalia opens her eyes wondering what he is talking about. Her own eyes catch sight of what has caught his anger. They are at the end of the forest seeing dried blood all over the trees and ground. A lone rusted pick axe is on the ground next to a message.

[Beware the Two Headed Black Dog in the mine]

"We have another detour to take, Raphtalia." Yuudai states setting her on her feet. The blood is trailing to the mountain side a few miles away. It seems that whoever was killed here was dragged to the mountain side. Most likely to the mine.

"D-do you really think it's a good idea to follow the blood?" Raphtalia asks having flashbacks to when her parents were killed...by a three headed black dog. Her entire village was massacred by the dog.

"I've made many mistakes, but that dog made the biggest one when it killed whoever was here." Yuudai replies to her. "To answer your question, yes. If it kills innocent people then I refuse to let it go free. So get on my back again."

Raphtalia doesn't do what he says though. The fear of seeing anything resembling her past monster keeps from following his order. He looks at her seriously noticing the fear. Yuudai's face loosens up at the sight.

"Is this about your parents?" He asks watching her eyes tear up. The teen wraps his arms around Raphtalia in a hug. "If you don't want to go in the mine then you don't have to. Wait outside the entrance."

She wraps her own arms around him surprising him. "Why must you push your luck? You're the only family I have left now. I don't want you to die." She tells him lightly crying.

"I'm here for you, Raphtalia. I don't plan on ever dying by the hands, paws, claws or anything else of anybody." Yuudai replies. He turns his head to the direction of the blood trail. The teen boy has just made the promise to dispose of the two headed dog for sure. Even if he has to get hurt in the process.

End

There we go. Another nice chapter to add to the collection of chapters I have up.

Let's clear up some stuff now. I made up the new shield while looking up some shields online. Originally I was going to use the italian lantern shield, but decided that a simpler shield is wiser. Speaking of which (If you don't want a spoiler for later on, skip the rest of the paragraph), the shadow gun is going to become a shield too. I'll find a way for it.

Sorry if the time skip bothered anyone, but it didn't seem like they need to go through a lot of unnecessary things. The difference in level is also explainable. Yuudai doesn't slack off. He's killed quite a bit of creatures.

Without much else on my mind, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	7. The Shadow Shield

What does the future hold? It holds us all. Then it drops others. Point? The future can only suck if you suck. Then again, the future only is there. Not to help. Yay for pointless banter!

Anyway, how are you all? Good? Bad? Hangry? I hate the word...not the point. I hope you are well enough since I'm about to answer some reviews!

Guest 1: Well I haven't thought of it. He could very well do it. He'll just have to remember that's a possibility.

OechsnerC: Why thank you again.

Zinmaster24: It was so very satisfying for me to write it as well. However, this will blow up when he sees the king again. No doubt. The shields are going to be interesting, but weird. I have to check up on all of them...if I can find a freaking site to find them all on. The crossbow shield has be mentioned as an idea already, so that idea may not be far from possible. Concerning the ring, that is an interesting concept. I never really thought of connecting it with Sonic. It does harness that kind of speed, yes. It could contain his power from its previous owners, but who knows. I actually just looked up stat points, so it might happen in the next one or two chapters. I know I played it out differently, but I can't imagine Yuudai ever taking leveling up slowly. That being said, he wouldn't let her slack either. Besides, if she is strong then she can knock out anyone that tries to make a racist slur. And thank you, I try to keep the grammar readable at least. I might have to look into it one of these days. Just a matter of figuring it all out. Once again, sorry for the long reply. I enjoy replying.

Guest 2: I've actually thought about it. We'll see.

Chapter 7: The Shadow Shield

"This isn't exactly comforting." Yuudai states looking for a couple bones laying around the entrance of the mine. He turns to Raphtalia worriedly. "Are you sure you want to stay here?"

Raphtalia's eyes are looking at the bones with fear. Unadulterated fear. It's her first time seeing dead bodies of humans. She even has an idea of what had done it.

"I...I'll follow you...for a while." She relents getting a nod from Yuudai.

Yuudai takes a quick glance around the area to find the door to an old rest station. The doors are ripped off their hinges with large footprints that would belong to an over sized dog going through them. Oddly enough, there are two sets. The sign of, possibly, two giant dogs. He keeps the information quiet hoping Raphtalia doesn't notice.

"Well it was a given to check the station for material already. This just makes it easier." Yuudai says to himself walking into the rest station.

Raphtalia follows silently looking in every dark corner. Every dark area in general. Looking for glowing red eyes to glare at her hungrily. To finish what its relative couldn't.

"Would you look at that. I found some rope." Yuudai points out picking it up. His shield starts to buzz again telling him of its compatibility. The teen lets his shield absorb it creating the Rope Shield.

His shield screen pops up again. It has unlocked the Rope Shield, but it has an ability called Rope and a equip skill called Air Strike Shield. The screen unlocks another shield called Pick Axe Shield from him adding that to the shield. It was laying beside the rope. The new shield adds one point to the mining ability.

Yuudai changes the shield into the Rope Shield revealing a coiled rope as a shield. The boy deadpans at it. He thinks the door offhandedly making the wrap around it. Yuudai raises an eyebrow at the idea of just thinking of the item then it'll be wrapped in rope.

"It'll be useful, I guess." Yuudai mutters changing the shield back into the Sword Shield. Best to be prepared. Especially when two giant dogs are running around. He picks thinks about looking for a lantern, but toss away the idea. It's one thing to light wood with sparks, but he has no way of lighting a lantern. "Let's push on then."

Raphtalia wraps her arms around Yuudai's arm in response. To feel the comfort of something. Anything to stop her dread. The two press on walking deeper into the mine.

A few minutes of walking leads them into a spacious cavern. One with a waterfall pouring into a small lake. Not quite a pond though. That's when Yuudai spots a small, for its breed, two headed dog. A puppy.

Raphtalia's grip around his arm tightens. She has just seen the dog as well. He pats her head with his other hand pulling out of her grip.

"Whatever killed the people in this mine or killed your parents can't be all this stupid mutt's fault." Yuudai tells her quietly. Her eyes don't lighten up one bit. Yuudai sighs laying a hand on her shoulder. "I will harm it, but you need to kill it."

Raphtalia's eyes widen to the point of total disbelief. "B-but I can't!" She exclaims. Yuudai can see that her beliefs are now firm, but that's no excuse.

"If you don't kill it then you'll always be afraid of it. You might as well be telling me that all those idiot slave traders and racists that they were right. That's not how I taught you to survive. I taught you to kill your fear like you kill Orange Balloon." Yuudai explains to her with conviction.

She braces herself gathering her courage. "I know. I just can't." She replies looking to the ground losing the courage.

The two headed dog lets out a very loud howl. Yuudai quickly turns around seeing the dog rushing for them. The teen grits his teeth running at the the dog.

"If you don't kill it, I will keep it as a freaking pet!" Yuudai threatens blocking one of the heads. "A house broken one!"

He then swings the sword end up cutting the left head's nose open. Yuudai jumps back a few meters watching the creature howl in pain. It's at that point that a much bigger orthrus, the two headed dog, come into sight. It's easily as big as a small house.

"I changed my mind. Jump into that lake, Raphtalia!" Yuudai orders bracing himself. Fighting against two dogs like this...he has to hope they aren't very fast.

Raphtalia's eyes go blank as she falls to her knees. Her whole body is limp from the sight of two. Yuudai grits his teeth. He can't throw her into the water without the risk of her drowning.

Both dogs run at him now giving him no time to think. He slams the shield against one of the heads of the big orthrus pushing it away, but has to jump away again to avoid its other head. The teen becomes straight faced realizing he can easily cripple them.

Yuudai becomes more than a blur in the next moment. He reappears in front of Raphtalia protectively. The teen watches its legs start bleeding heavily forcing it the the ground. The small orthrus sniffs at its apparent parent.

It then whirls around with both heads snarling. Yuudai stares it in its eyes walking to it slowly. It stalks towards him as well, clearly ready to attack him.

"I'm going to put you down like Old Yeller." Yuudai states making a reference to his world again.

The dog heads come at him from both his sides about ready to tear him to shreds. He rolls under the left head swinging his sword up. Blood comes out like water while the left head falls off. The other head shrieks, as much as a giant dog could, in absolute agony.

"Unfortunately, I don't have gun to do it properly." Yuudai states slowly grinning. He side steps quickly avoiding the snapping of its head towards him. "Or do I?" Yuudai tries to summon his gun, but instead his shield screen appears. A new shield appears like his Sword Shield, but instead of it being the Sword Shield, it's called the Shadow Shield.

Yuudai's eyes widen in surprise. His screen disappears causing him to gape at his shield. Out of his rune is a dark energy seeping into the shield gem. It turns into a dark shield with a wind symbol in one corner and the gem in the middle. That too starts to be glossed over becoming a shield of darkness.

"What is this?" Yuudai asks himself. His reflexes force him to put his shield up to block a bite from the it. The one headed puppy orthrus pulls away about to attack again. But a feeling in his gut is telling him to hold his shield up.

The teen raises his arm in the air with the shield creating a shadow creature. A giant orthrus head is created from shadows about the shield baring its teeth at the puppy. Yuudai swings his arm down mentally ording it to attack.

The shadow head bites down on its neck shaking back and forth drawing quite a bit of blood. The real orthrus tries to hit it with its paws or bite it, but its attacks always go through it. Yuudai, while in awe, mentally orders it to finish the job. With the one thought, the shadow head pulls back ripping its throat out in the process.

Yuudai stares in awe still. His shadow head disappears back into his shield rejoining the shadows of the Shadow Shield. The orthrus howls in pain one last time falling to the ground in a bloody heap.

Yuudai tries to marvel his new shield, but both of his shoulders are impaled by teeth. Sharp teeth. Pain shoots through his body unused to the pain. He hears the growl reverberating through his body telling him what did this.

The big orthrus throws his body against the wall not exactly hurting him. He gets back up definitely feeling the stab, teeth, wounds even though the orthrus is now glaring at him from some meters away. The teen never expected the dog to get back up. He let his guard down and got another reminder.

His chest wound creates a phantom pain from two years ago reminding him that keeping his guard up is what keeps him alive. It can happen again. He looks to Raphtalia to check on her, but doesn't find her.

His fear rises until the shriek of pain erupts from the two headed dog. He looks over to find Raphtalia attacking the dog. Her eyes are still glossed over, but not with just anger. Determination is in there too.

"You and the other monsters won't ever create another orphan. Never. Not before I'm dead!' Raphtalia states ramming her sword into its chest. Right into its heart.

It howls, but is quieted as Raphtalia twists the sword enough to kill it. The bigger orthrus falls onto its side next to its offspring. It would be very heart warming if the parent hadn't just injured his shoulders. The experience points spread to the duo raising both of their levels by two. Yuudai walks to Raphtalia's side smiling at her.

"Did you get it all out?" Yuudai asks turning his shield back to normal. He'll have to check it out later.

Raphtalia's eyes clear up again coming back to her senses. She looks at her sword and to what she has done. She has just killed one of the creatures that came from the first wave like the three headed one. The thing she couldn't even imagine getting near.

"I think so…" Raphtalia says quietly. She wraps her arms around him closing her eyes. "If it wasn't for you getting attacked...you could have died because of me not taking action."

He embraces her to the best of his ability. "You did take action. That's all that matters." He retorts having her look at him. "Just make sure to do it at the beginning of the fight next time."

Yuudai pulls away from the hug. He turns the shield into the Sword Shield grimacing. The boy has to butcher one of the dogs. To add it to his shield. Though it might be for show for the next long while. With his new shield and all.

Within the next half hour he has it cut up enough to put some in his shield. This creates a shield called the Two Headed Black Dog Shield. Its equip effect is alert shield and the special effect is Dog Bite.

Yuudai chuckles at the name of the special effect remembering his shadow dog head. The humor dies out trying to figure that out. What happened to his gun? It just created a shield of darkness. It's supposed to be a gun.

The hero shakes the questions out of his mind so that he can pull out some medicine and gauze. He bought the gauze before leaving, obviously. The teen cleans the wounds and then wraps the gauze around both wounds.

"That's cleaned up now." Yuudai says. He looks to Raphtalia. She is pretty messy. "If you want, we can stay here for a little bit. Just clean up in that lake."

She perks up happily at the mention of water and clean. She undresses quickly so that she can get into the lake. Yuudai laughs a little bit at her antics then looks at himself. He isn't much better off.

"I think I'll wait to get to that village." Yuudai mutters knowing that the water is no doubt cold. Saying that, he lays down on his back letting his wounds rest as well as his body. "The wave doesn't know what's coming."

End

How was that? The fight lasted quite a while, so I feel accomplished. It's hard to keep an important fight going with a guy that is very strong.

What do you think of Yuudai's new shield? It's his replacement for his shadow gun. Seeing as I couldn't integrate it without doing it weird or violating the legendary weapon rules, I decided to one up it. Shadow Shield!

Spoiler of its power right here: any attack it collides with, depending on the attack, will become useless and will copy any attack. As you've seen with the shield, it can even copy the attack of the orthrus...the one headed orthrus...fun. Let's see how that develops, hmm?

Without much else to think of, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	8. Backfire Of The Shadow Shield

Yo yo yo, what up? You can't get over this story! You know why? Neither do I.

So many followers and favoriters...let's answer the reviews, shall we?

OechsnerC: It was fun to do and I can't wait either. I can already imagine the fight.

Zinmaster: I guess it is like her semblance. Let's just say that enemies are more screwed than they ever thought possible. And the axe shield idea. That is axe-ually brilliant (Puns are fun). And Elhart already is a great craftsman, so he could do it. No problem.

Chapter 8: Backfire Of The Shadow Shield

"Thank you so much!" The chief of Riyute, or Lute, thanks bowing. "People haven't been able to mine in there in so long since those two monster arrived."

Yuudai and Raphtalia are standing side by side at the village they intended to arrive at before their detour. They are outside with the whole village watching. Yuudai gives the man a smile. "It was no problem. We couldn't stand by after seeing somebody's blood splattered everywhere." He replies while Raphtalia nods her head in agreement.

"If you ever need somewhere to stay, just come here. The Shield Hero will always be welcome here." The chief announces hearing the whole village cheer.

"Thank you so much." Yuudai thanks respectfully. "I'll always help out if it's in my power."

The crowd cheers again bringing a bigger smile to his face. This is what he missed most of his days of being in Halkeginia. The gratitude from others. The knowledge that his actions will make people happy.

"What is your plan now that you cleared the mine, Hero?" The chief asks.

"The plan is to travel around looking for monsters to kill. I'm hoping for a dragon, but if it's something weaker then that's fine." Yuudai answers casually.

Raphtalia stiffens up at the mention of a dragon. "Why a dragon? Are you trying to kill us?" Raphtalia asks.

"I have to ask the same thing. Are you trying to kill yourselves?" The chief agrees asking his own question.

"I really want to try my new shield out more and if I can attack a dragon with its own attacks then I might as well be the strongest hero there is." Yuudai replies grinning.

"You're willing to die to test that theory?" The chief asks again.

Yuudai sighs. "Fine. I'll hold off on the dragon for now." He relents. If they really want him to hold off on the dragon slaying then he'll hold off until level thirty at least. For Raphtalia.

Raphtalia sigh in relief. "Thank you, Yuudai." She thanks.

"The Shield Hero's name is Yuudai?" The chief asks in surprise. "Such an unusual name."

"I'd like it if you and everyone could call me Yuudai." Yuudai says looking around. "No need to be formal. It makes it seem like I'm useless."

"Useless?" The chief questions.

"Imagine what you think of a shield. A tool used for protecting. Nothing else." Yuudai tells him. The teen looks at the border of the village and the road finding a horde of Loomush, Bluemush, Greenmush, Eggards and Orange Balloons. "Why are a bunch of creatures over there?"

The chief and the villagers eyes widen in fear. "S-something must have led them here!" The chief says backing up. "Can you help us?"

"I thought it was obvious that we would." Yuudai states walking to the creatures now running at him. He looks to his side seeing Raphtalia already pulling out her sword.

"Do you think we lured them here?" She asks quietly.

"It's a possibility." He replies changing his shield into the Sword Shield. "Likely because of the Shadow Shield being used earlier."

The two start clashing with the creatures slowly, but efficiently. As they thought, the creatures only cared for attacking him and Raphtalia. The fight only lasted two minutes, but considering each hit killed the creatures, there was a lot of creatures. The fight gives them each six hundred experience.

The two level up again making Yuudai level twenty eight and Raphtalia level twenty. Yuudai's screen appears again, but this time telling him he has many unspent skill points. The hero sighs shaking his head. He should have been able to know this already.

He figures out the way to spend it and puts some in defence, some into agility, some in special points and the rest into his health. The teen can feel the effects once closing the screen. It is actually a relieving feeling. He and Raphtalia make eye contact nodding.

"Perhaps using it attracts enemy creatures in the area to us after using it." Yuudai suggests walking back to the chief.

"That could be useful if that's true." Raphtalia tells her master. "We'll have to test it later."

Yuudai chuckles a little bit. "You are becoming smarter each day." He compliments her causing her to faintly blush.

"Thank you again!" The chief thanks running to them.

"No problem, but we should probably leave. Due to some circumstances, we need to." Yuudai tells the chief.

The chief nods understandingly. "Just know that you always have a place here."

"We will. Goodbye." He replies walking off with Raphtalia. They walk wordlessly to the base of a mountain and by the forest stopping there.

"Ready?" Raphtalia asks.

"Getting cheeky, huh?" Yuudai asks with amusement in his voice.

He straightens his face changing his shield into the Shadow Shield. The black shadows wash over it again until it covers everything again. His mind grows curious, so he tells it through his mind to grow into the size of a body shield and it does exactly that.

Raphtalia stares at the shield with curiosity in her eyes. It appears that the shield's size can be manipulated. That's actually very useful. The shield to put other shields to shame.

He shrinks the shield into the size of a watch on his wrist impressing himself every moment it's out. The teen brings the shield back to its original size. He looks at Raphtalia smirking. It's that time.

"Take out your shadow gun, Raphtalia. Before the enemies get here, I want to test out something." Yuudai says. She wordlessly summons her gun holding it in her hand awkwardly.

Yuudai pats his shield then projects the action in the form of a shadow hand. He moves the hand to Raphtalia patting her head with it. The hand disappears back into the shield while Raphtalia deadpans. Yuudai just laughs at her deadpan expression.

"This shield is amazing!" Yuudai states seeing the endless possibilities.

"You use the shield that ripped that two headed black dog's throat out...to pat my head." Raphtalia says slowly. "That's kind of morbid."

Yuudai waves the comment off. "If you keep thinking like that you'll be sickened on what I'll be doing to the other heroes with this."

Raphtalia sighs looking him in the eyes. "Don't kill Motoyasu."

Yuudai sighs too hearing her say that. "Fine. I won't kill him."

"Or mortally wound him." She adds.

"You're taking the fun out of my shield!" Yuudai exclaims crossing his arms. The both of them just start laughing for a few moments. "Point your gun in the air and pull the trigger then shoot."

She nods pointing the gun into the air. Raphtalia pulls the trigger letting the brown bullet fly up. It keeps going until it reaches sixty meters in height. The girl disappears where the bullet stops. Her eyes widen in fear right as she starts to fall.

"Look around! Observe the area!" Yuudai shouts to his companion.

She gulps down her fear looking around. The eyes of fear return to her seeing what's coming for them. Five humanoid figures in armor are stalking towards Yuudai. Her fear is present due to the fact they look like they are going to gang up on Yuudai. She then realizes how stupid that fear is.

Yuudai hasn't lost a fight before. He has taken a spear through his chest before. She only knows that because of his stories he tells her. Raphtalia hasn't gotten to see the wound yet though.

She shoots at the ground appearing there instantly. "Humanoid enemies coming from the forest area." She reports seriously.

Yuudai hums to himself in thought. "Should I beat them with a head pat or kill them with a giant dog head?" Yuudai wonders outloud.

"I wish you'd stop acting like their lives don't matter." Raphtalia says deadpanning at him again.

"It's their fault they're coming after me." Yuudai retorts. He looks at her with a straight face. "The way I see it, if they come for my life first then they should be ready to lose their own. After I interrogate them."

Raphtalia tilts her head in confusion. "Why would you interrogate random people?" She asks knowing they'll arrive soon.

"If they happen to thugs, mercenaries, bandits or something of the like then I have no doubt someone sent them. Likely Yasu and his girlfriend." Yuudai replies explaining his thoughts.

The teenage boy turns to the forest without humor in his expression a second later. Raphtalia looks to the forest as well. She doesn't like his disregard for other lives, but his logic isn't flawed. To their surprise, the five figures walking to them are in royal armor. The guards of Melromarc.

"In the name of Aultcray Melromarc, you are under arrest for the assault of his own daughter." One of the guards announce. Yuudai and Raphtalia look them all over noticing the barely noticeable shaking. They are afraid.

"Did she tell him to suck it?" Yuudai asks taunting them. The hero already knows they can't win. Time to toy with them. Especially since they confirmed his suspicion.

"Y-you dare insult his majesty?!" One of the other ones ask incredulously. This one isn't shaking in fear.

"You must be a new guy." Yuudai says smiling deceivingly. "Haven't you be wondering why your buddies haven't attacked me outright?" Yuudai holds his shield up summoning the giant shadow dog head. It lets out a loud roar leaving everyone with their ears ringing.

They all fall on their butts staring at the shadow beast. The new guard's pants become stained making even Yuudai cringe. He wanted to scare them, but come on. Running would leave people with more dignity. The guy doesn't stand a chance with anyone if that got out.

"I have half the mind to kill you all." Yuudai tells them crossing his arms. "What could possibly give me reason to stop?"

"T-the w-whole kingdom will come after you!" The new guard exclaims.

"Shut up already!" The four other guards yell at him.

"He has a point. Doing anything could become a problem." Raphtalia reasons. He looks to her sighing.

"While that's true, they already hate me. They'll bring me in for anything. If I stole their precious bacon stash they'd freak out!" Yuudai retorts.

"You're the one that stole that?" The first guard asks.

"That's where you got it all?" Raphtalia asks as well.

"Not the point." Yuudai states avoiding the question. "The point is that no matter what I do now, they'll come to lock me away."

"Do you think they'll stop if you killed more of them?" Raphtalia questions. "You'll only be justifying their retaliation against you!"

The teen hero sighs again. He mentally orders the beast into his shield. The shield then turns back into its original form. Yuudai turns around.

"Fine. I won't kill them. Let's leave them to...the experiment." Yuudai says saying the last part to himself. Raphtalia smiles happy she managed to convince him to not kill the guards.

The two walk for a minute before hearing screams. Yuudai smirks turning around while Raphtalia whirls around at the sound. Right where the guards are standing are tons of creatures surrounding them. Where they tested his shield's backfire for using it.

"You knew that would happen." Raphtalia accuses glaring at Yuudai.

"Sorry Raphtalia, but I wasn't completely sure that would happen. Ignoring that, I didn't kill them." Yuudai replies to her. The boy thinks to himself for a second. "I am starting to sound like the bad guy...I'll be the anti-hero then."

She shakes her head. "Don't do that again." She orders him.

"Fine fine." Yuudai relents. "Do you want to help them?"

"Not really." Raphtalia answers causing him to sweatdrop.

"What happened to that righteous belief just now?" He asks.

"It's their fault they came for us." Raphtalia states reciting what he said earlier.

"I am a horrible influence on you." Yuudai says offhandedly. "Let's go back to Riyute. We need to sleep in a bed tonight."

The two walk off leaving the guards behind. A sixth figure jumps out from the woods firing arrow after arrow at the creatures. Once the enemies are all killed the person shows himself to be Itsuki, the Bow Hero.

The guards smile happily feeling incredibly relieved. "Thank you so much Bow Hero!"

The short haired blond nods in acknowledgement. "Did you encounter the Shield Hero by any chance?" Itsuki asks.

"Y-yes, he is a few miles ahead going towards Riyute village." The new guard quickly tells him.

"Shut the hell up! We lucked out already!" A different guard yells at him.

"Be safe now." Itsuki says smiling at them. He starts jogging towards the direction of the Shield Hero with a purpose. For the assault against another hero and his teammate. "You won't get away with that."

End

There we go! We got another chapter my friends! How do you like that?

Sorry for the no chapters in a quick minute, but I was attempting to help write a new story. It didn't seem like I had the drive for it. Unfortunate as that may be.

I may take a quick breather from this to work on Fear Of Mages, but we'll see. What do you think of Itsuki coming for Yuudai? Pretty unexpected, huh?

The way I have seen and read things, Itsuki is the righteous one. He'd be the most likely to go after him for assaulting another hero and being wanted imprisoned by the king. Ren is one I can't see caring too much as long as there is no death.

All things aside, I enjoy this. I know you all do too. So without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	9. The Bow Hero's Defeat

Who are you? I'm your entertainment for the next few minutes. Or however long it takes you to read. Doesn't really matter, we only need to know it'll be entertaining. For instance, the reviews! By the way, thank you to all the new followers and favoriters and the old ones!

Guest 1: Pacify...I like that phrase. I like it very much. I also like the idea, so we'll see what happens down the road.

Pinkdog16: We all know it. He'll learn that you should never go after the beast.

OechsnerC: Unfortunately, he can not use his gun. It was replaced by the Shadow Shield. Since it would be a weapon violation. It would have been in his possession still, but I couldn't find a way to turn it into a shield. Though we still have the future. There might still be hope for it.

Chapter 9: The Bow Hero's Defeat

"Is it just me or is there a feeling of something annoying coming closer?" Yuudai asks keeping his hands in his jacket pockets.

Raphtalia listens carefully hearing the footsteps of someone running. "It's not the guards. Just one person." She informs him. "In other words, it's not just you."

The two turn to the direction of the footsteps waiting for the person. Eventually, a blond boy stops five yards away from them. He is carrying a bow in his hand. The boy is glaring at Yuudai in general.

Yuudai leans closer to Raphtalia. "Do you know this guy?" He asks.

"I thought you knew him." She replies raising an eyebrow at him.

"Did you seriously forget about me, Shield Hero?" The blond asks feeling a bit offended.

"I can't remember every bow wielding blond I meet." Yuudai answers crossing his arms.

"I'm Itsuki, the Bow Hero." Itsuki reminds him.

Yuudai's mind instantly remembers him at those words. It doesn't put a smile on his face though. Last time he saw the guy was when he first arrived. That was when he was threatening the king and anyone in the room at the time.

"What do you want then? You can't exactly train for the horde if you're stalking me." Yuudai states causing Raphtalia to sigh and Itsuki's eye to twitch.

"You assaulted another hero, his partner and have broken several laws in the time span you have arrived in this world. I'm here to take you in after beating you in a duel." Itsuki explains grandly. It's as if he believes he can win. Raphtalia chuckles at that. Itsuki looks to her seeing her slave symbol for the briefest of a second. "And you have a slave to add on to your horrible crimes."

Yuudai tilts his head in confusion for a second. It then registers that Raphtalia was technically a slave. "In all honesty, I completely forgot."

"That's not surprising." Raphtalia says not willing to admit that she forgot as well. Her experience sucked, yes, but the time spent with him has been a ride that has only let her look forward into the future.

"Quit getting off track!" Itsuki shouts. "Duel me, Shield Hero!"

Yuudai sighs. "This is such a drag." Yuudai says copying the phrase of a anime character from his world. "I'll accept your challenge. Just tell me, what are the gains of mine if I win?"

Itsuki grits his teeth hearing his arrogance. "On the off chance you win, I won't ever challenge you again. If I win, you let her go and follow me back to the city."

"The challenge is pointless to me, but I guess I can entertain you for a moment." Yuudai accepts. "Step back a little ways, Raphtalia."

The raccoon girl responds by stepping back like he said. The Shield Hero cracks his neck and knuckles. "Be careful, Yuudai."

"When am I not careful?" Yuudai asks smiling at her. She points at the shoulder wounds of his. "Other than that."

"Punching Motoyasu and Myne." She adds.

"To be fair, I didn't punch Yasu." Yuudai retorts turning to Itsuki. "I'll be sure to stay safe."

"For your injustices, I will make sure you get locked up!" Itsuki shouts getting his weapon ready. "Unless you happen to die in this unofficial duel."

Yuudai stares at the Bow Hero in surprise. "I didn't take you for the type to kill with no solid proof. Best to teach you your place early on."

"Lightning arrow!" Itsuki shouts pulling back the bow string holding a streak of lightning there. He lets it go at Yuudai, but the black haired boy already switch to his Shadow Shield. He readies himself having a flashback of the Viscount Wardes situation.

Having that thought in his head, the lightning strikes the shield pushing him back a little ways. As soon as that finishes, he lowers his shield looking at itsuki again. Itsuki isn't who his eyes register though. It is Viscount Wardes. The one that killed Wales, betrayed Louise, hit him with lightning impaled him with a wind arrow and attacked Siesta's village.

"Hurry, familiar. Otherwise you might just lose Louise." He threatens pointing at Raphtalia. He turns to her to find Louise standing there instead. She is standing there in fear with tears running down her face. The effects of his Curse Series triggered by the lightning bolt.

"Shut up, Viscount...this time you're dead!" Yuudai roars feeling as if he is back in the kingdom of Tristain trying to protect Louise again.

Raphtalia's eyes widen. The name Viscount connects to his darker past. One he always got a bit angry over each time he mentioned it. If he is seeing Viscount in Itsuki's place...it's not good.

Itsuki raises an eyebrow at the name and rage in it. 'He must be trying to decieve me by using petty tricks.'

Yuudai's ring activates making blue streaks in his hair, but his eyes go dark blue this time. The teen shoots forward coming at Itsuki breaking the sound barrier. He uppercuts him into the air breaking the poor blond's jaw.

Yuudai uses his shield to create five shadow versions of the lightning bolt shot at him. He orders them all to attack Itsuki causing his eyes to widen. The blond shoots at the ground using an arrow with a rope connected. Itsuki pulls himself to the ground barely avoiding the five ark lightning bolts.

Itsuki's eyes are riddled with a bit of fear unaware this kind of rage would be set upon himself. He doesn't get to rest though because Yuudai appears in front of him with his fist already hitting home in his gut. Itsuki coughs up some blood from the impact. He makes eye contact with the his current executioner to find no remorse or pity for him.

"You will never hurt anyone else, Viscount! Never!" Yuudai yells again seeing Viscount coughing up blood.

Yuudai sucker punches the man in the cheek sending him flying to the left. Pieces of teeth fall out as Yuudai appears ahead of the flying Viscount. The teen brings down his elbow timing it in time to hit Viscount's chest. The sound of his rib cage cracking sounds causing more blood to come from the man.

Raphtalia is holding her hands over her mouth. Her eyes are watching a one sided beat down. He might as well be curb stomping the poor Bow Hero. She admits he brought it on himself, but this is brutal. She needs to stop this before he actually kills Itsuki.

Yuudai holds the beaten bloody Itsuki by the collar of his shirt still glaring at the blond. "You killed, deceived and injured others. What do you have to say for yourself?" Yuudai asks angrily.

"It's not Viscount, Yuudai!" Raphtalia shouts running over to him.

"Stay out of this, Blanc. He'll get what's coming." Yuudai states never turning to her.

She wraps her arms around his own. "It's me! Raphtalia!" She tells him. "Please stop this! That's not Viscount...it's Itsuki. The Bow Hero."

Yuudai turns to her questioningly only to find Raphtalia. Louise is nowhere in sight. He turns back to where he believe Viscount to be, but finds the Bow Hero instead. The teen drops him with wide eyes.

His memory informs him that this was supposed to be just a duel. Though he had been threatened, it was supposed to be nothing more. The evident fear in Itsuki's eyes proves more than enough that it was much more. More than needed.

He drops the blond to the ground. Yuudai almost murdered one of the four heroes. Over something that is far into his past. He turns away from Itsuki.

"Sorry…" Yuudai mutters changing back to normal in the aspect of his power and shield.

Raphtalia doesn't let go though. She fears that he'll run away. Run away claiming that he's too dangerous to be around.

"Y-you're a h-hacker!" Itsuki cries out. Yuudai's face turns into confusion.

He turns to the blond looking at the fear in his very stature. "Do you really think this is a game?" He asks feeling a little bit of irritation. After everything that Yuudai went through...this boy thinks it was just some game. "Get this through your head. This is no game. People, animals and demi-humans are real and they all die. Now if you would kindly go to hell."

Yuudai turns around without a second thought walking towards the town. Raphtalia holds onto his arm the whole walk. It's best not to let go of him. Not in his current state.

Yuudai stays silent the whole walk into Riyute. Raphtalia is the one that gets their room for the night. Once in the room, Yuudai sits on the edge of the bed. Raphtalia sits next to him worried for her friend.

"What was that all about?" Raphtalia asks in a soft tone.

He looks to her without emotion in his features. "I almost killed a guy for someone else's life choices. That's what happened." He answers plainly. "I felt bad for hurting him so much at first...when he said I was a hacker...it made me realize he thinks this whole thing is just some sick game." He goes silent for a moment. "Perhaps I should finally tell you everything I've gone through. That might explain my momentary rage."

After that, he began to tell her his past experiences. The changes in worlds twice and his adventures in Halkeginia. His mood slowly improves throughout his explaining. If his self satisfied voice is anything to go by.

"Then, as anti-climactic as can be, I was simply spirited away into my normal life. It took a year for me to finally be called to this world. That's everything from my past." Yuudai finishes up.

Raphtalia is staring at the teen as if he is a world renowned savior. "You were solo hero in another world?" She asks excitedly.

Yuudai sweat drops still smiling. "That's all you got out of it all?"

She shakes her head. "No, but it just means you're destined to be a hero. No matter where you go." She says.

"That's true." Yuudai replies nodding. "Getting back on topic, Viscount Wardes is the reason I attacked Itsuki like I did earlier. I was seeing things and felt as if I was back protecting Blanc. He threatened her and I snapped."

"Would you protect me like that?" Raphtalia asks curiously.

"You can protect yourself very well." Yuudai states. Raphtalia sighs in defeat. "However, if you need my protection then I'd protect you with my life."

Raphtalia smiles hearing him say that. "Thank you. I'll always be there for you too." She says. She then turns on him pointing at him threateningly. "You better not disappear from this world though. Not without me."

Yuudai laughs for a moment good naturedly. "If I leave, I leave, but I'll be sure to take you with me." He tells her. The teen boy lays on the bed all the way looking to the side for Raphtalia's bed. There is no other bed. "I think you made a mistake."

Raphtalia lays beside him with a stern look. "It's not a mistake. It's assurance that you don't run away." She replies smirking at him.

"We're stuck with each other. I wouldn't run away if the whole world told me." Yuudai states looking at the ceiling.

"I'm not too sure you'd want to go against the world." Raphtalia says sweat dropping.

"That's true...it would be a massive headache." Yuudai admits trying not to imagine it.

Raphtalia giggles a little bit at his antics. "I know I shouldn't be worried about the wave, but when is it supposed to be here?"

Yuudai hums in thought. "I'd say...a day or two."

"What?!" Raphtalia exclaims. "We've been doing all this random stuff with only a day or two left?!"

"That sounds about right." Yuudai answers not worried at all.

"Then again, this is you we are talking about." Raphtalia then sighs. "Will we really be ready for the wave?"

"Of course we will. We've been ready." Yuudai replies. "Let's get some sleep. Who knows if we'll have to wake up to the wave or not."

"If that happens the wave will have a free Shield Hero buffet." Raphtalia jokes smirking.

"Am I hearing back talk?" Yuudai asks jokingly.

"You'll never hear the end of it. After all, it's what you talk me." She states. The both of them laugh joking with each other for an hour. That's just how the Shield Hero is. The hero that the corrupted world needs.

End

That's the end! How was it? I hope it was...acceptable.

I know you all were excited for this chapter. The part where he sees Viscount is something I thought would be interesting. Here's to hoping it was. On the bright side, Bow Boy got the crap kicked out of him. That's always nice, hmm?

May I also say, they skipped so much in the new episode! I loved it, but they skipped so much! Poor Zombie Dragon...Filo stole its heart, technically.

How's about the wave finally coming? I think I'll do it next chapter. Tell me, would you like an extended chapter where I push it on in the three thousand range to show more action or should I keep it short with Yuudai just destroying everyone quickly. Here's a little tidbit of information to help...Yuudai will fight the Chimera eventually.

Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	10. Power Of The Shield Hero

One...two...three...four...I won't keep the score. Five...six...seven...eight...SHIELD BASH!

What's up my friends? You ready for the wave? I know Yuudai is, but I'm not. Are you? Are you sure? Wait...do you hear that? It's the sound...the sound of new followers, favoriters and reviews!

Pinkdog16: Alrighty then. That'll be easy. Motopedo...I'll assume you mean Motoyasu. And I don't think I'll kill them off yet, but that doesn't mean I can't mortally wound them or something of the like. I feel so much pride reading that. Don't worry, I've learned that if you can feel that reading a story then that means the story is good. Good enough to read till the end.

Chapter 10: Power Of The Shield Hero

"So what you are telling me is that I have ten minutes before the wave?" Yuudai asks looking at a giant hourglass.

Yuudai and Raphtalia are in the hall where the dragon hourglass rests. The two snuck into Melromarc and into the hall. They had to do it without anyone noticing due to the fact the whole town probably hates him now. Two heroes...he beat up two heroes in the span of a week.

"Who are you talking to?" Raphtalia asks sweat dropping.

"Nobody. Sometimes it's just relieving to talk to inanimate objects. Don't know why, it just is." He replies looking to her. "Do you think we should get out of here or just wait here until the wave gets here?"

"So the Shield Hero finally shows himself in public. Surprising." A cool and collected voice says.

Yuudai places his fingers along the bridge of his nose. "What are you doing here, Slashy?" He asks confusing Raphtalia and the newcomer. Raphtalia understands a second later.

"Why did you assault the other heroes?" The Sword Hero ask. "Don't get me wrong, I don't really care. I just don't want to earn the wrath of the Shield Hero for something I wasn't aware of."

Yuudai turns to the other black haired boy. "Seeing as you're not attacking me or accusing me of a lie, you are already on my 'he exists, but I don't care' list." Yuudai replies trying to make a joke. It fell flat. "Anyway, don't lie to me and continue to do your job in this world. That's the safest way to go."

"I see." Ren says thinking over the easy task. All of a sudden they are transported away to a field.

The sky overhead is littered with tons of red holes. The holes are swirling in sinc. Out of the holes are monsters dropping to the ground. Yuudai looks to his side to find the other heroes.

The Bow Hero is still very much injured. To be fair, it was only a day and a half ago since his beating. The others are just fine with their followers right beside them. Out of all the eyes looking around, he catches sight of Motoyasu looking at him.

"If you are going to look at me then take some advice. Don't let your girlfriend bleed all over before she gets to the battlefield." He tells him confusing the poor Spear Hero.

"Yuudai!" Raphtalia exclaims slapping the back of his head. "Don't say that again!"

"Fine." Yuudai says rubbing his head. He then points behind her. "Hey Raphtalia, look at the village over there! We need to help them!"

The raccoon girl looks in that direction giving Yuudai the chance he wants. He quickly turns on his ring's power and kicks Motoyasu and Myne's feet out from under them. With a small laugh, Yuudai jets off in the direction with Raphtalia in tow. It wasn't supposed to hurt...just to entertain himself.

Yuudai arrives first due to his speed figuring out where he is immediately. It's Riyute village he is standing in. The monsters are just now arriving in the forms of locus, giant bees and interdimensional zombies. The whole jacked up scene disgusts Yuudai more than he cares to admit.

"I'll hold them all off until Raphtalia is able to get here. Then I'll find the boss of this horde." Yuudai plans out to himself. He changes his shield into the Sword Shield. "Hey monsters! Attack me instead!" A dark ring forms around him then pushes out through the small village.

Surprisingly, every monster in the area turn to him with a red glow in their eyes. They slowly creep closer making Yuudai raise an eyebrow. His screen appears glitching out for a moment. It solidifies quickly saying I have two new abilities. Special Ability: Weak Horde Control and Special Ability: Interdimensional Zombie Summon.

Apparently it has a few minutes before it can be used again. These are strange powers though. As far as he's knows, these are universal moves among the heroes. Therefore, he starts his killing spree without thinking into it.

He starts cutting open the locus and bees in half. The hero cuts them all open and any zombie coming too close gets its head kicked off. He goes about this for two minutes trying to figure out why the horde isn't thinning out yet.

"Yuudai!" Raphtalia calls out finally arriving. He smiles backflipping out of the middle of the monsters. The teen lands right next to his friend.

"Listen, I need you to look out for Riyute for a while." Yuudai tells her.

"What are you going to do?" She asks. He changes his shield in the Shadow Shield causing every enemy monster to look in his direction. Even ones in the vicinity of the other three heroes.

"I need to lure all these monsters away. Make sure nothing happens in this place. If it happens to be human or demi-human, incapacitate them. If it's just monsters then kill them." Yuudai orders. She nods.

"Be careful." The second she says this, he jumps on a building starting a run for an empty open field. That way nobody can be hurt by the creatures.

As expected, every monster of the wave is running for him. The one monster to stand out though...the Chimera. The monster with the body and head of a lion while the head of a goat and dragon linger beside the lion head. The tail is just a snake.

Yuudai jumps up a lone tree standing at the top. He looks around finding thousands of enemies gathering around. The Shield Hero summons a few hundred shadow lightning bolts and the head of the Orthrus. He then uses the summon ability to summon fifty Interdimensional Zombies around his tree.

If a traveler was to look at him, they'd only see something resembling a god. Without a look of empathy, all his lightning bolts shoot at creatures of the wave as well as the summoned zombies rushing for their brethren. The dog head growls going in to tear apart the other monsters too.

The scene is filled with enemies being ripped to pieces and sparks of black electricity damaging, sometimes killing, any monster nearby it. The one monster to run through all of this is the four headed monster. The Chimera.

It runs for Yuudai's tree he's standing on with a murderous intent leaking off it. The said hero stares down the monster the whole time. He has proved himself a monster in his own right. No way will he back away from something that hasn't proven itself.

The dragon head roars spewing out hot flames. Yuudai makes his Shadow Shield expand blocking the attack. It stops allowing him to make his shield normal size again. He raises his shield creating a vortex.

The vortex sends out black flames at the Chimera. It jumps back avoiding it, but the other monsters are instantly burned to ashes. The vortex closes stopping the flames. Yuudai continues to stare down the Chimera unimpressed.

Many miles away, the three heroes, all he guards and adventurers are watching in shock. In this dark moment with monsters literally falling from the sky, the monsters go after one hero. That hero should be dead by all means, but he is killing every single one of them by only standing on a tree. On his own!

"How can he do that?" Motoyasu asks in a quivering voice.

"It's like the developer gave the Shield Hero all the strongest abilities." Itsuki states gritting his teeth from the pain of his bout with the other hero.

"All I know is that guy must have trained to a very high level before the wave." Ren comments very impressed.

"B-but how! He is supposed to be weak! Nothing more than useless!" Myne states very fearful.

Motoyasu grins seeing his teammate panicking. "Don't worry my dear, Myne. I could easily take him." He claims.

"Good luck with that." Itsuki says spitefully. "If he is this strong then that slave of his would beat before you could get to him."

Hearing the prospect of a slave, Myne smirks. 'It's time to take away the slave...in good graces.'

Yuudai summons the tail of the beast in the form of shadows having just be attacked by its tail. The impact had sent him flying off the tree despite him blocking, but he landed on his feet. The Shield Hero makes the tail hit the beast abside its head knocking it over. Quickly he summons the fire setting the Chimera on fire.

The Chimera's heads all screech in pain as the black flames blaze around them. Yuudai lets this continue until it stops screeching. The sign it has died. He stops the flames looking around his battlefield. Ashes and bodies are everywhere despite the sky slowly returns to normal.

"Looks like they don't clean themselves up." He comments bringing all his shadow creations back and desummoning what zombies are still alive. He then changes his shield to its original form. "On the bright side, I know everybody survived."

His shield buzzes again directing him to the body of the Chimera. He takes some of the beast for his shield. The screen pops up again introducing the Chimera Shield Series. He ignores the new shields though.

"You did it, Yuudai!" Raphtalia exclaims running up to him. She hugs him getting a hug back from him.

Yuudai smirks victoriously. "I know. It was a walk in a park. A very loud and destructive park." Yuudai states egotistically.

"Well you at least didn't take any damage." Raphtalia says rolling her eyes before speaking.

"Speaking of which, how was Riyute? Any stragglers?" Yuudai asks pulling out of the hug.

Raphtalia shakes her head. "None. Only a bunch of guards that I had to force out of the village to keep it safe."

Yuudai nods understanding the situation. "Great job, Raphtalia." He compliments. She beams happily.

"E-excuse me...Shield Hero." A shaky voice calls for him. He turns to the leader of the guards. Judging from his stature, he is the one that ordered the temporary attack on Riyute. Seeing as he is looking at Raphtalia fearfully too. "T-the king has asked all the heroes to the palace for a feast for the heroes."

"And you're here to tell me I'm invited, right?" Yuudai asks sarcastically. The guard leader nods in confirmation. "What do you think, Raphtalia? Go and enjoy the food or leave these idiotic bastards to their pointless feast."

"It's free food, Yuudai. Free food!" Raphtalia exclaims making Yuudai facepalm.

"There you have it. We'll be there, I guess." Yuudai tells the guard reluctantly. He was really hoping Raphtalia would hate them too, but they haven't wronged her yet, so it's very understandable.

Later In The Royal Palace Celebration Space

"I hate these people so much." Yuudai states taking another bit of food. "Their cooking skills are so good though!"

"I know what you mean." Raphtalia says with her mouth full. "This is the best food I've ever had!"

Yuudai deadpans at her. "I'll remember this when I make you food again." Yuudai comments causing her to stiffen up.

"I-I mean other than monsters! This food is the best palace food I've ever had!" She reasons finding that reason good enough. He smiles laughing again.

The whole room is full of people celebrating. From adventurers to royals. All celebrating the fact that nobody died in the wave. The wave wasn't even very long thanks to the heroes. Or should I say, hero.

Everybody thinks the three other heroes won the day, but those that watched knows who won. It wasn't them, it was the Shield Hero. Seeing as everyone there hates him, he never cared to correct them.

"Mr. Yuudai!" A loud voice booms. Yuuda sighs knowing the voice. What does the Spear Hero want?

Yuudai turns to the blond spear wielder. "What do you want this time? Pretty sure my silver coins should have kept you from getting near me." Yuudai states patting the very coin bag on his hip.

Motoyasu cringes for a moment feeling a phantom pain in his groin. "How can I fear you when you drag around a SLAVE!" Motoyasu yells angrily.

Raphtalia perks up unhappily. Yuudai clenches his fist. "I have a companion, yes. You have a problem with it?" He asks daring him to say yes.

"Obviously! You drag her around like she is just luggage!" Motoyasu explains unable to see the truth.

Yuudai puts a hand to his chin taunting the blond. "What do you think, Raphtalia. Please, tell them your opinion on his attitude."

"I think he needs to shut up." Raphtalia replies glaring at Yasu.

Motoyasu growls in anger. "You even have her under a spell to not let her speak her true feelings." He throws a glove towards Yuudai. "I challenge you to a duel!"

"Sorry, but I must have left my deck at home." Yuudai says smirking. Motoyasu must understand the reference since he only gets angrier. "What's the conditions?"

"If I win you must turn yourself in and let her go!" He replies. "If you win then you will go free with her."

"How generous. Hey Itsuki, how did our last bout with each other go?" Yuudai calls out earning a very colorful curse word in return. "Sure. I guess I have time for a late abortion."

Raphtalia smacks the back of Yuudai's head again. "No saying that either!" She orders him.

You'd think this would make the Spear Hero think about his decision, but he doesn't. The two leave for the garden finding it all ready. As if it was already predetermined that they'd fight. From a balcony, the king is watching smirking at Yuudai.

Yuudai then stares down Motoyasu. "This time I'll have to break something to teach you a lesson."

End

How was it? I think it was pretty good. I felt like I just showed off how strong Yuudai can become and it felt awesome.

About the shadow creation of his, it can be used to his content. If he wills it, it will do what he wants. He can only create one dog head and fire vortex at a time, but if it's something as simple as a bolt of lightning then it can be created many times over at once.

Who's ready for Yasu to lose? I know I am...anyway, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	11. Declaration To The Palace

It's time to Cross Off something...another chapter it seems!

How are you all doing? I hope you are doing good. I am, so I hope you are too. Thank you all for following and favoriting this story. Let's get to them reviews.

Guest 1: Let's see if Myne even gets the chance to cheat.

killuaap: Is this a choking Sasuke meme? If so, well played. Well played.

Pinkdog16: Oh ho ho, perhaps. That is definitely a possibility now that he doesn't necessarily need to use his legs now. Sweet! I see. I want to be surprised, but I'm not. Yasu is an idiot.

OechsnerC: Wait no longer! Let's see.

Guest 2: It definitely has benefits. As long as the fictional bad guy is competent then it is. It gives them the chance to make a smart ass come back.

Guest 3: Well I didn't intend Raphtalia to be emotional support constantly like in the original. Yuudai only took her in for the reason of saving a sickly little girl. It just so happens he wants her to survive and travel with him.

Chapter 11: Declaration To The Palace

"Listen up everyone!" The king says in a booming voice. "As a force of good fortune, the Spear Hero has challenged the criminal Shield Hero! These two will fight it out and only one will win by being pinned or the opponent admits defeat." The king smirks. "I believe it's obvious who will win."

Yuudai smiles at the king mockingly. "I didn't know you had faith in me. It warms my heart that you believe doesn't exist." Yuudai states sarcastically. The king's smirk fades quickly turning into a frown.

"Begin!" The king orders as everyone in the palace starts watch the fight.

Yuudai changes his shield into the Sword Shield surprising Motoyasu. "I'll let you attack first, Yasu. After all, it's only fair." Yuudai says unable to stop smiling.

Motoyasu grits his teeth glaring at him. "Don't you dare mock me!" He roars running at him. Motoyasu jabs his spear at Yuudai. "Chaos Stab!"

His spear splits into many different ones closing in on the Shield Hero. The teen doesn't bother to use his ring's power though. This doesn't require such. Yuudai maneuvers around the spears cutting across his chest with his blade.

Yuudai jumps back a way landing on his feet as his chest starts to bleed. The pain registers in Motoyasu causing his eyes to widen. The crowd cries out in rage, but Yuudai just ignores them. The point is to teach him a lesson. Not to entertain a childish kingdom.

"What was that? I told you to attack me, not bore me." Yuudai taunts yawning.

Motoyasu grits his teeth again. "You even mock me by not doing your best…"

"If I did my best, you'd already be dead." Yuudai retorts boredly. He pulls out of his pocket a shiny stone rock. "Would you look at this. Real entertainment."

Yasu growls looking at the object. "You think a stupid stone is more entertaining?!" He exclaims.

Yuudai tosses it up and down a few times. "Try to actually get me involved now."

Yuudai walks towards him slowly. Yasu jabs his spear again, but Yuudai smacks it away with his shield. Leaving him wide open, the Shield Hero elbows him in the nose. Yasu reals back in pain feeling his nose start bleeding. It's a fact that his nose is broken.

"I overestimated you...how did I do that?" Yuudai asks himself curiously. The Shield hero tosses the rock over his shoulder dismissively.

Yasu raises his spear allowing electricity to flow all the way to the tip of the blade. "Electricity Spear!" He yells the name bringing down his spear.

Yuudai shoots forward doing something nobody ever thought he would do. Yasu's eyes widen in pain coughing up blood. He looks down to find Yuudai's sword deep in his chest. The entire crowd is caught in a silence. Unable to say anything.

Yuudai pulls out his blade standing back. Yasu drops his spear falling to his knees. He looks up to the Shield Hero only to see his foot kicking him onto his back. The standing hero walks over to him standing over Yasu.

"That was for trying to ruin my life multiple times." Yuudai states plainly. He grits his teeth looking around to all the surrounding people. "This is the dumbass hero you are putting your trust in!?" Yuudai questions yelling. "Someone that assumes the worst in people without asking the accused?"

"Silence, criminal!" The king orders angrily.

Yuudai sets a glare on the king. "How about you shut the hell up?" He retorts flipping him off. "I'm the one doing the dirty work a hero isn't seen doing to save you all! Not to fancy up your unrealistic fantasies!"

"Calm yourself, Shield Hero." Ren tells him walking onto the field.

"Don't make yourself an enemy, Ren. You're the only one that I can even stand." Yuudai says to him. Ren doesn't show it, but is surprised he remembers his name. Seeing as making an enemy of himself isn't smart, he steps back into the crowd. "You wanted four heroes, but you only got three normal people with fancy titles and one that actually knows his way around the battlefield!"

His instincts tell him to move, so he moves to the side avoiding a fist made of wind. It crashes into the wall creating spider web cracks on it. Yuudai looks to its source already knowing who it was. It came from Myne.

"So someone wants in on this duel?" Yuudai asks rhetorically.

"Touch her and I'll make you enemy of the kingdom!" The king yells angrily.

"Talk to me like that again and I'll inflict her pain on you instead." Yuudai tells him without turning around. "For your information, that isn't a threat. It's a promise."

The king shuts his mouth not willing to risk his life. Not even for his own daughter. The Shield Hero starts his walk for Myne striking fear in her almost instantly. She runs through the crowd into the celebration room stopping to look behind her.

Her breathing stops as Yuudai grabs her by the throat. Yuudai glares at her finding fear screaming in her eyes. Her dark soul is shivering from even being the target of his anger.

"Did you think I would let you get away with this for so long?" Yuudai asks knowing everyone is still watching him. "My distaste for you has peaked. Now here is your reward for getting so far."

Yuudai lets go of her throat punching her in the gut. She bends over holding her gut in pain. He then uppercuts her connecting his fist and her nose. Myne is airborne for a second only to be sent flying backwards by another punch from Yuudai.

She crashes into a wall indenting herself into the wall. Her body gets stuck in the wall unable to fall. The royal girl is a stranger to pain so it's no surprise she is now unconscious. Yuudai walks back onto the field watching Yasu stand up shakily.

"You think you're being brave by getting back up?" Yuudai asks standing face to face with him. "If I was the criminal you believe me to be then tell me one thing. Why do you think I didn't use my Shadow Shield to murder you already?" Yasu thinks back to his dark shield remembering its godly powers. "Stay down now. I can only enjoy hurting another human so much before being disgusted by myself."

"Get out of my damn castle before I send every guard in this kingdom after you." The king orders angrily.

Yuudai pushes Yasu on his back again walking away. "Don't you dare bleed out yet. I don't need anymore stress on my mind." He tells the Spear Hero.

"However, the slave girl shall stay here." The king states smirking. That was Yuudai's snapping point.

Yuudai runs over and jumps to the balcony. The king tries to move backwards, but the hero is too fast for him. He grabs the king by his beard throwing him onto the garden field. The king gets up looking around angrily.

Yuudai jumps back to the ground glaring at the king. "Call over your magicians and guards to watch them die or stay quiet while I show you what happens to a king that gets too close to a familiar's breaking point."

"Guards!" The king yells.

Many curses and magic spells fly at him, but they all miss. As a matter of fact, as the dust clears, his blade on the shield is bloody and his hair is streaked blue. The king's eyes widen looking around to his magicians. They are all...armless. They all are missing the entire arms.

"They can't attack me if they can't use their magic." Yuudai states. He stares at the speechless crowd. "Your king has forced me to resort to methods that force others to suffer rather than die. It is because he has threatened my friend."

Raphtalia, meanwhile, is staring at all the events in horror. She knew he'd protect her with his life, but everything he has done has been horrifying. To think he'd go this far to protect her from everyone. She doesn't move though. Her legs won't let her.

"Now having an entire kingdom coming for my throat will be annoying so here is a deal." Yuudai says walking closer to the king. "Keep your people away from me and I won't cut your limbs off one by one."

The king grits his teeth, but he knows the hero is serious. He stabbed the Spear Hero for crying out loud! The teen even assaulted his daughter whom is still unconscious.

"Fine. I won't promise that there will be those that wish to kill you for your treason, however." The king replies.

"I'm fine with that." Yuudai states changing his shield back to normal. He pulls his fist back and punch the king's nose eliciting a cracking noise. The king falls on his back now bleeding from his nose. "Let that be a forever reminder. To never again mess with the Shield Hero and anyone in my company."

With that, he starts to walk out of the palace. Raphtalia runs after him quickly. She's not afraid of everyone there, but it isn't comfortable there. Or anywhere at the moment. She feels like Yuudai finally made his opinion of the king and his allies very clear.

Raphtalia catches up to Yuudai in the streets with his power off. He turns to her looking serious. "Raphtalia...I want your opinion on something."

Seeing him this serious, she pushes aside his recent massacre from her mind. "W-what is it, Yuudai?"

"Do you want me to have your slave seal removed?" Yuudai asks shocking his friend. "All it has done is cause trouble and I know that you don't exactly enjoy when I lash out at them for it."

She keeps staring at him speechless. After everything that just went down, this is his question? The girl steels herself for her answer.

"If...if it's fine with you. However, let's wait until tomorrow for our money we are due for." She replies hoping to let him rest. It's a big decision after all.

Yuudai's straight face quickly turns into a smirk "You see, my friend, before I started to eat, I decided to use the restroom."

Raphtalia tilts her head wondering what that has to do with money. "I remember that, but what does that have to do with anything?" Her mind then realizes what he really was off doing. "You didn't…"

He unzips his bag showing her four large sacks of silver. "I figured something would happen and decided to take everyone's silver. This is actually over eleven thousand silver in all." He tells her.

Her jaw is slack in shock. He stole all that money! All without being noticed! His skills scare and relieve her so much at times.

"Let's rest, quickly visit the armory, get your seal removed then leave this place." Yuudai lists off looking around. "Pretty sure if I stay around here everyone will be out for my head."

"But they can't hurt you." Raphtalia says quietly still trying to comprehend everything.

"It doesn't mean they can't give me headaches." Yuudai says sighing. "Besides, I don't like the idea of harming innocent people. No more than I already have."

Raphtalia nods understandingly. It seems he doesn't enjoy hurting people all the time. It's only for the necessity of survival.

The two continue to walk away. "So where are we staying?" Raphtalia asks causing him to stop dead in his tracks.

"That...is a good question." Yuudai replies trying to quickly think of somewhere. "Let's stay at an inn, I guess. I have the money for it."

"I'd hope you do." Raphtalia says thinking of all he has stolen.

"Let's get to stepping then. We have a big day tomorrow." Yuudai states walking again.

End

That's done! The first volume has been finished. And no, I don't plan on doing the side stories of the first volume.

I'm sorry this chapter is so short, but I wanted to finish it here. I want to leave the rest for another chapter. Hope it's a good choice.

What did you think of the fight with Motoyasu? I think I went easy on him, but stabbing him gave him the message intended for him. Same with Myne. Though she has more than likely hasn't learned her lesson. Oh well, more fun for us.

Heads up, I am putting chapters for this story up on another site too. Not going to stop uploading here, but I'm going to see if others that don't visit this site like it as well. Anyway, without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	12. The Magic Shop

Who are you? Why are you here? What is your affiliation? Well, you see, it doesn't matter here. You read and enjoy yourselves. Are we clear? No? Good.

Darkjaden: Not one bit. Before uploading the chapter, I thought back to Myne and tried to think of what else could be done to her. Considering I don't want to kill her just yet, I decided it was enough.

Guest 1: I thought it said intellectual boner at first, but then I added up the lettering. In which case, how so?

Mangel111111111: Thank you! I'll always do my best!

Pinkdog16: I figured it wouldn't be enough for most. I like to think of it as motivation to keep people around to see further punishment. I think I heard that fact somewhere before. Or I might be thinking of the extremists of the black plague era...who knows.

OechsnerC: thank you, I tend to be able to do that...once in a while...not very often. Glad to have done it!

Guest 2: I've actually, no joke, have thought of that. Then I threw it out since I'd have to be in the other continent before I could get anyone to create a gun. Let alone a good old shielded gun like that. A shielded gun was actually going to be used as his rune's thing until I decided on the Shadow Shield.

Chapter 12: The Magic Shop

"Welcome back, Shield Hero!" An annoying, at least to Yuudai, voice greets.

Yuudai braces himself for his next meeting with the midget. "Not exactly excited to be back, but here we are." Yuudai says honestly.

Raphtalia is next to him walking into the tent. The tent where she had been returned to so many times before. Her mind is at ease knowing it isn't for any slave reasons this time. In fact, she is getting rid of her slave symbol.

The short and chubby man walks to them with his never ending grin. His face lights up in surprise upon seeing the grown up Raphtalia. "Seems like she was a diamond in the rough all along. Wouldn't you say so, Mr. Shield Devil?" The short man asks.

The nickname catches both Raphtalia and Yuudai off guard. "Shield Devil?" Yuudai says questioningly.

"You haven't heard?" The short man asks chuckling darkly. "Some have taken a liking to the name, Shield Devil. Thanks to your performance at the wave."

"Yuudai is no devil!" Raphtalia exclaims defensive of her friend. "Isn't that right, Yuudai?" She asks turning to him.

To her disappointment, he is grinning like an idiot. "I actually like that name. I'm the hero and a devil now." Yuudai says offhandedly.

Raphtalia puts her head in her hand. She lets out a sigh. "Of course he would like the name."

"So what brings you in?" The short man asks Yuudai.

"I know this may be a bit unorthodox for you, but I'm wanting you rid Raphtalia of the slave seal." Yuudai tells him seriously.

The chubby man tilts his head surprised. "You're right. That is a bit unorthodox. Why would I do that?"

"Five hundred silver says you will do it without question." Yuudai says taking out the sack of five hundred silver that was going to be given to him when the heroes got their monthly funds.

The man's eyes sparkle. He takes the sack opening it to make sure that it is as much as he claims. Once sure, he closes the bag.

"I can remove it now." He says leading them to the room he officially acquired her in the first place.

A few minutes of silence pass as the procedure is going on. Yuudai looks around bored then lays his eye on a wooden box. "So do you keep demi humans in crates now?" Yuudai asks.

"Finished." The man states. He then turns to the hero. "Not quite. That crate there contains eggs for my cover business."

Yuudai deadpans at him. "And here I thought you didn't hide the fact you sell slaves." He mutters.

"The eggs are for people that like to train them for their adventures." The slave trader informs him.

Yuudai's eyes light up in amusement. "Pokemon...this guy is giving away pokemon!" Yuudai mutters to himself. "I should buy one. Just imagine! My own pokemon!" He explains saying one of the things a lot of people would fantasise about in his home world.

"Though it is a lottery." The trader tells him.

"Don't care! How much?" Yuudai asks already deciding to buy one.

"Yuudai...are you sure that's a good idea?" Raphtalia asks carefully.

"It is one hundred silver." The trader tells him.

Yuudai tosses the money at him taking a random one on the right side. He holds it up. "My very own pokemon."

"What is a pokemon?" Raphtalia asks trying to figure out his sudden obsession.

He turns to her grinning. "A show that was good until it was given to other countries! Now I can have my own!" He exclaims laughing like a mad man.

"I think he might have a screw loose." The trader whispers to Raphtalia.

"I wish I could tell you otherwise." Raphtalia replies sighing.

"Now copy the symbol on the egg into the dish next to you." The trader instructs. He does as he is told watching the symbol glow red.

A new icon pops up above his status screen icon. The icon is called monster training. Yuudai keeps grinning like an idiot. The trader brings over an incubator letting Yuudai place the egg inside.

"It should be hatching sometime tomorrow." The trader tells him.

"I get my very own pokemon tomorrow! Take that people back home!" Yuudai yells in victory. The trader and Raphtalia sweatdrop.

In Real World With Iwatani Naofumi

Naofumi sneezes out of nowhere looking around. "That was odd." The college student says.

"What's weird is that you still think the possibility that pokemon will never exist!" A fellow otaku exclaims right in front of him.

"It will never happen!" Naofumi yells having been at this for a half hour.

"Technology will make sure it does!"

Back With Yuudai

"So...what do we do now?" Raphtalia asks walking by his side back into the streets.

Yuudai is carrying his new egg in his unzipped bag right now. "Well...leave town I guess." Yuudai replies calmly. The idea of technically having a pokemon has become less awesome in his mind the more he thinks about it. "There isn't much else we can do here."

"Are you the Shield Hero?" An older looking pudgy lady asks. Yuudai and Raphtalia look to her in confusion. She doesn't sound furious.

"If I said yes, what would happen?" Yuudai asks carefully.

Raphtalia elbows him in the gut. "Yes he is, miss."

"She's probably been waiting to do that for some time." Yuudai mutters.

The pudgy lady smiles at the two. "I'd like you both to follow me to my magic shop." She says to the two.

Raphtalia goes to make a rational and thought out decision for the two, but Yuudai answers first. "We'll follow you." Yuudai says making Raphtalia sweatdrop.

"What happened to when you were making rational decisions?" Raphtalia questions her friend.

"I decided to get rid of that for now. Too stressful." Yuudai replies waving his hand dismissively.

The pair follow the lady into her store. Yuudai's mind originally thinks it's just a bookshop, but then he catches sight of magic stuff figuring out the real reason for being there. Either this lady wants them dead or wants to reward them.

The lady smiles at them standing behind her counter now. "I'd like to thank your two's help at Riyute village. My grandson lives there, thank you." She thanks.

"I wasn't at Riyute for very long though. Raphtalia here was." Yuudai admits.

"Do you really think I don't know what the Shield Devil is?" She asks with amusement in her voice. "You lead all the monsters of the wave away and your friend protected the village from the knights."

Yuudai sweat drops and Raphtalia blushes. "So everyone knows the nickname, Shield Devil?" Yuudai asks.

"Everyone in this city, at least." She answers.

"Good. I just have to hope nobody outside of this place knows." Yuudai mutters to himself. "As long as it does, I won't have to worry about scaring away people. It would be problematic."

"Nonetheless, the reason I brought you two here is to reward your efforts." The lady says gesturing to her crystal ball. Yuudai eyes it with interest finding a great deal of interest in it. "Please, allow me to gauge your magical affinities."

"Alright. Just don't try anything weird." Yuudai tells her deciding to be safe with a nonthreatening warning.

She nods looking into the ball. The teen boy tries to look into it, but it shows nothing to him. After a moment, she looks up to him seeming very surprised. "It seems the Shield Hero is more than he is said to be. You have the affinity for defense magic and an even more powerful affinity for wind magic."

Yuudai is about to be confused, but then remembers his wind magic he can use. He hasn't used it since a month before leaving Halkeginia. That would be more than enough reason for his forgetfulness.

"It is telling me you can learn more if you are so inclined, but I don't think you will want to use wind magic. Seeing as your wind magic obeys your commands to any degree." She states.

"How do you know this?" He asks blankly staring at her.

"Well the ball is. I'm seeing you use that magic without incantation or grimoire. It leads me to believe that you wind magic is connected to your soul." She replies smiling at him still.

"So you are saying you had another power that leaves you pretty much invisible this whole time?" Raphtalia asks very surprised.

Yuudai nods looking to her. "I guess so."

"Why did you even get the egg then?! Or me for that matter?!" Raphtalia exclaims.

"First of all, the egg is a freaking pokemon. I've pretty much preached the reason. And I got you because I didn't want you to stay there...that and the fact that I would be very lonely on my own. Or destructive." Yuudai explains to her. He then decides to start thinking over everything in his mind.

The raccoon girl sighs. "It seems the young miss here is better suited for light and shadow magic." The lady informs catching Raphtalia's attention.

"That's understandable." Raphtalia says knowing that her people would often speak of it.

She brings out three books setting them on the desk. "Here you are. I'd like to give these to you both as thanks for what you have done for Riyute village." The lady tells them.

Yuudai returns his attention back to the ladies. "Thank you very much ma'am." Yuudai thanks giving her a little bow.

"It is no problem. I'd give you a crystal ball if it wouldn't put me out of business." She says smiling brighter.

"What would be the point? I wouldn't be able to use it." Yuudai states trying to reason why he couldn't.

"Didn't you know? If you can free the magic that is sealed in a crystal ball, you'll learn it instantly." She informs him. She then puts up a finger adding more. "Quite a while ago, the country went ahead and ordered a large number of crystal balls for the four heroes. Haven't you heard anything about this?"

"Not one peep." Yuudai replies knowing the exact reason why. "I would march over to demand the reason, but I already…" Yuudai looks to Raphtalia. "Commandeered their silver."

"Yes...commandeered." Raphtalia says slowly. It still bothers her.

"Once again, thank you very much for your kindness." Yuudai thanks again.

"Yes, thank you very much." Raphtalia thanks as well bowing.

"Shield Devil...I can't find the reason for it to be a proper name for you." She admits. She the shakes her head.

"I know you have a business to run, so I'll be leaving. If I am ever back in this town I'll make sure to buy something from you." Yuudai says walking towards the door.

He places the books he had grabbed from the counter in his bag feeling it get heavier. It's nowhere near heavy for him, but he can tell it would be for anybody else. His companion looks to him.

"You don't plan on stealing those crystal balls, do you?" She asks making sure. They don't need more reason to be chased down.

"No plans on it. They likely used them by now anyway." He tells her. He sighs walking towards the gate of the city. "Let's start heading towards Riyute. We can map out our proceedings after we are out of city limits.'

"There you are, thief!" Three voices yell.

Yuudai grins laughing a little bit. He then turns to the three other heroes. "I see you have found me out, Yasu, Suki and Ren." Yuudai says mocking a typical villain voice.

Yasu and Itsuki growl at their nicknames. Ren just sighs with relief seeing as his name hasn't be butchered. "Give us our payment!" Yasu and Itsuki yell.

The black haired teen Shield Hero looks over the two. They still have wounds from their duel against himself. Yuudai takes out two silver coins.

"What are you doing?" Raphtalia asks worrying for Ren's safety. She doesn't much like the other two.

A rune glows beneath Yuudai's glove. Right next to his shadow weapon rune, an wind rune appears. He knows this very well feeling in tune with the very air around him.

"First, Yasu." He starts off. The Shield Hero throws one of the coins right through Yasu's stab wound. It goes right through making him fall on the ground. "Next Suki." The short haired blond prepares for the worst, but finds the thief only tossing the silver coin to him.

"What is he attempting here?" Ren asks himself quietly.

Just before it reaches Itsuki's hand, the coin is cut to hundreds of little pieces. Itsuki's eyes widen in shock. He couldn't see anything and Yuudai's Sword Shield couldn't have done it since it would be to thick to cut it up so small.

Ren keeps his surprise unnoticed. He goes to look at Yuudai finding him tossing a hand full of coins to him. "Take it Ren. I respect you that much." Yuudai states turning around. The three don't bother calling for him again. Mostly since one was shocked out of his mind, another was bleeding through a still fresh wound and Ren didn't bother caring too much.

"Was that necessary?" Raphtalia asks her partner.

"Not one bit, but it was very amusing." Yuudai tells her.

End

There is the end! How was it? Great, am I right? No? Well...crap.

Anyway, the wind power of his is an actual thing. It's nothing something I'm making up out of nowhere. It's in the more recent chapters of The Fear Of Mages, but it is something he has had. I just haven't found a more perfect time than to introduce it now.

I am going to be getting back to working on The Fear Of Devils very soon too. Likely once this is up. The love for this story is very awesome! Thank you for liking this! FRIENDS OF MINE, UNITE!

Anyway, without anymore nonsense, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	13. In The Swamp

You...you did it. You...have broken me. Broken so profoundly that I can see right through myself. Wait...wait...wait...loading screen. It sucks waiting for an interesting moment, isn't it?

Anyway, how are you all? Doing good? Great! If not then crap. I hope you get better. Let's all warmly greet our new friends with some reviews!

Victor John Foxfire: Yeah, I know. I've read into their descriptions to find out about their personalities better. Itsuki is not a great guy. If anything, he is a hypocrite prick. Right right. Ren isn't bad, from what I've seen. Thank you, I enjoy giving credit to the original characters. That way it lets others know they are living people still, just not super powered. We all know it. Yuudai will laugh like there is no tomorrow. We'll see. After all, he doesn't hate Ren.

OechsnerC: Thank you again!

Kyle77776: Why thank you. It would be funny, but I think that would be better as a type of skit or something.

Pinkdog16: Yeah! Both of them! Not Ren though...Ren is good for now.

Guest 1: Sorry about that. I just now found out that my gmail notifications censor words it deems as "Bad". I definitely know the feeling. We probably all had one.

Don Fenriklvanov: I could have changed the wording from the manga, but I didn't. It seems pretty weak, but oh well. Beginning a story is always difficult.

Chapter 13: In The Swamp

"This is interesting." Yuudai says walking around a floating monster.

The duo are walking at the edge of the forest right now. They spent the night at Riyute's inn the previous night after the meeting with the three heroes. Yuudai had decided it was a good idea to start on training at the edge of the forest for a little bit to get in a little morning warm up. That way if they got in a fight, they wouldn't lose due to it being their first fight of the day.

He is holding the creature in the air in front of himself using his wind magic. It has many uses now that he is testing it out. He doubts flying will be possible, but that isn't very concerning.

"So...are you going to kill it or just stare at it?" Raphtalia asks feeling sorry for the creature.

"I'll finish up, don't worry." Yuudai tells her letting his magic cut its throat. He drops it from the magic's grasp to the ground.

"You are way too violent sometimes." Raphtalia states. He kills the creatures so brutally sometimes acting as if it is some kind of comedic thing. Seeing as he protects her and she cares for him, she doesn't run away.

"As long as I don't start thinking it's enjoyable, it'll be fine." Yuudai replies to her. He looks into his bag picking up the egg again. "My pokemon egg will be hatching today...I can't wait!"

"It probably won't be hatching for a good few hours." Raphtalia says to him knowing it is only reasonable. Too bad she hasn't learned he doesn't deal in reasonable yet.

The egg makes an audible crack surprising Raphtalia. Yuudai grins happily looking at the egg much more carefully. The egg then breaks apart all the way showing a cute feathered bird monster. On its head, part of the egg shell is staying kind of like a hat.

It jumps at his face not startling Yuudai at all. Seeing what it wants, he helps lift it to the top of his head. It then starts rubbing its cheek against his head lovingly. This makes Yuudai ecstatic.

"It loves me already! Yes!" Yuudai cheers happily. "What type of creature is it though?"

Raphtalia deadpans at him. "I thought you said it was a pokemon?"

"Well it is similar, but this is a different world. I highly doubt it is a real pokemon." Yuudai tells her.

"Other than that, it seems like it sees you as its parent." Raphtalia points out.

"What other titles can I possibly gain in this world?" Yuudai asks rhetorically. "Anyway, we should probably figure out where we can get information about…" Yuudai looks moves his eyes to look up. The bird tilts itself to be in his vision. It chirps happily. "The bird girl."

"How do you know it's a girl?" Raphtalia asks curious on how he could easily say that.

Yuudai sweat drops. "Let's just say that I've been around enough women to be able to tell." Yuudai replies. A mental picture of Ruka Urushibara from a show called Steins;Gate pops into his head. He shivers. It scares him how easy it is to mistake him for a girl.

"Ignoring the implication, we should head back to Riyute village then. They might have an idea." She suggests.

Yuudai nods. "Back to Riyute we go." He states starting their trek back to Riyute.

An hour later, they are at a ranch at the edge of the village. They are walking up to the rancher right now. The man catches sight of them giving the a smile.

"Hey there, how are you two doing?" The rancher asks pleasantly.

"Well I was doing good until I had to wake up." Yuudai replies jokingly. The rancher chuckles while Raphtalia giggles a little. "Anyway, me and my friend, Raphtalia, was wondering what this little bird on my head is." He explains pointing at his head.

The rancher looks at his head to be greeted by a chirping bird. "I'd say that is a baby Filolial." He answers. "It is a very common variety of Filolial, but they have trouble staying calm without a cart to pull."

Yuudai nods putting his hand to his chin. "That is fairly annoying, but that isn't a bad thing. I could travel around without always walking as long as I find a cart for it to pull around." He turns to Raphtalia finding her tearing up.

"I finally don't have to always practically run to keep up or deal with his unnatural speed. Finally." She says. Yuudai sweat drops finding it hard not to be amused.

"So what do baby Filolials eat?" Yuudai asks turning back towards the rancher.

"You should start her on cooked beans, mushed into a puree. Something soft. Once she grows up, she won't be picky. They'll pretty much eat anything once they are adults." The rancher explains.

"That should be easy enough. Thanks." Yuudai thanks walking away.

"Do we have any beans?" Raphtalia asks him once they are a few miles away.

"I believe we do." Yuudai replies. The bird chirps again. "Speaking of the birdy, we should name it."

"Good idea! "What were you thinking of?" She questions. He puts up a finger with an idea in mind. "Perhaps Ayasu, Yuno or Kotohana."

Yuudai stares at her in horror. "How dare you try to assume that poor Filo will grow into a yandere?!" Yuudai exclaims comically.

"What's a yandere?" Raphtalia asks confused. "Putting that aside, you just called her Filo. Is that her name now?"

Yuudai remembers quickly that most wouldn't know what a yandere is in this world. Or why he is making so many anime references today. "That will be her name, yes. I didn't pick it rather than felt like its name was already chosen and I just had to say it." The bird chirps three times happily.

Raphtalia smiles patting Filo's head. Yuudai deadpans feeling as though he is getting a head pat too. "So what should we go now?" Raphtalia questions.

Yuudai can only shrug. "I've heard about some Big Frogs in a swamp some ways away. We can always wander over there to see what's up." Yuudai says. "Or we could just start traveling to random places. Maybe we can fight a dragon next."

"You already killed that Chimera during the wave and you are still looking for a dragon?" Raphtalia questions acting as if that is crazy.

Filo chirps rapidly pretty much declaring its dominance over any kind of dragon. "See? Even Filo is excited!" Yuudai reasons feeling very proud of the new addition to his party.

"She hasn't been here for even twelve hours! She hasn't learned that your ideas are borderline crazy sometimes!" Raphtalia retorts honestly.

"We're not dead yet, so my ideas can't be all that bad." Yuudai says. He then decides on the swamp. "I can tell you still are afraid of dragons, so I guess we can just go to that swamp."

"I'm not afraid. I just don't want to die yet." Raphtalia states pouting.

Two Hours Later

"So the name isn't misleading, I guess." Yuudai says looking at a giant frog. It comes up to his waist. If he were on the ground, at least.

He, Raphtalia and Filo entered the swamp a few minutes ago. Seeing as he deemed it to risky to walk on the ground, he decided to jump from branch to branch. He called it ninja style jumping. Raphtalia followed his lead. After all, he acts crazy, but he knows what he's doing.

Yuudai looks beside him finding Raphtalia by his side. "I want you to get the drop on Kermit here." Yuudai tells his partner.

"Who is Kermit?" Raphtalia asks. She isn't as interested this time though. He has been making references that has confused her all day. It isn't far fetched she is going to just ignore the references soon.

"This world needs culture." The teen boy mutters. "Anyway, just drop in on him. Once he is dead, others are likely to come along. I'll get those ones."

She nods in understanding. Raphtalia pulls out her sword jumping off the branch. Within the next second, her sword is already deep inside the frog. The frog quickly dies as she pulls out the sword.

Yuudai activates his wind power feeling the air around him come under his control. As he predicted, two more enemy creatures come closer. One Big Purple Frog and one Gray Salamander.

Quickly and easily, Yuudai forces air to filled up its body. A moment later and it explodes leading a bloody mess with poison in it. The Gray Salamander avoids all of the poison landing its eyes on Yuudai.

It jumps at him, but in mid jump has its back slammed to the ground from wind in the shape of a sledge hammer from above it. It hits the muddy swamp ground slinging mud everywhere. Raphtalia sighs finding that a bit of mud had made home on her armor.

The salamander is a muddy pancake on the ground now. Yuudai stays in the tree though. He still doesn't trust the muddy ground.

Some time passes by after that. At the end of the day, in the corner of his vision, the level up status screen pop up. It says Yuudai is level thirty three, Filo level twelve and Raphtalia level twenty four.

At that point, Yuudai is having Filo walking around on the ground. The bird had become larger during that day. He remembers Raphtalia telling him about the unusual growth of demi-humans and is having a hard time thinking of the two as different. It's as if the bird is a demi-human itself.

A grumble comes out of nowhere making Yuudai deadpan. This has been going on for a few minutes now. Grumbles here and there. He knows the cause of the noise though. The cause would be Filo's stomach. He looks into his bag finding the last slab of meat wrapped up that they had.

"Hey Raphtalia, I think we should feed this to Filo and then head back to Riyute. What do you think?" Yuudai asks from a tree branch.

She looks up from the ground next to the chirping bird. Filo seems very satisfied with the idea. Raphtalia nods. "We should. We've done a good deal of leveling up today."

He pulls out the meat unwrapping it. Yuudai then tosses the raw meat to the bird. Filo chomps the entire slab in one go. In the following seconds, Raphtalia and Yuudai are deadpanning. Filo lets out a soft burp getting a chuckle out of Yuudai.

"Why is that a simple burp enough to make you laugh?" Raphtalia asks looking up at him.

He grins closing his eyes. "I'm a very simple guy with very simple ways of being amused."

She looks around him. "So fighting treetop frogs and salamanders are part of the whole amusement package, right?"

Yuudai tilts his head questioningly. "I mean, it could be. Kind of a random question though." He looks around himself in case finding several big frogs variating in colors along with several salamanders. "How did you get up here?!"

At that moment, one of the giant frogs croaks. Croaks as if it is a war cry. It might as well be since all the creatures attack all at once.

End

Sorry for the wait on this chapter. It's been a while and you all deserve some good Shield Boy. Isn't he a good Shield Boy?

Yuudai: Keep talking, author. I promise to not hit you too hard.

...anyway, what did you think? I know I'll hear your opinions on it even if I didn't say anything, but I'll still ask. Maybe it'll end in a butterfly effect situation. Who knows?

Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	14. Rejected By The Church

Yo my friends! I am...I am...I am...nothing. You thought I'd compliment myself, but no. Not this time. Not before the thanking of my new favoriters and followers then replying to reviews.

OechsnerC: I actually haven't thought of that one very much. It definitely is possible, but I'd have to kill her off to activate his Wrath Series shield.

Vaxadeki: As you wish.

The Inquisitor: I had no idea about this and can't find any reference when I look it up. I know there is world traveling, but I haven't even gotten that far. But when I am able to learn more about it, besides the Warhammer 40k thing, then I'll plan something out.

RedBurningDragon: As you already have noticed, I love adding in joking moments where he can not be taking seriously. I find it as some comedic relief. So thank you for liking this, I hope you continue to do so.

Zinmaster: Thank you very much! And yeah, still a bit sloppy, but this chapter should be a bit better in terms of phrasing and whatnot. He could be since, unlike in Halkeginia, he has no real attachment other than Raphtalia and soon to be Filo. The feeling might be different to him. On to Filo...let's just say that when she become the loli everyone loves, it will be pretty good.

Chapter 14: Rejected By The Church

"How did you figure this out?" Raphtalia asks Yuudai.

Yuudai, Raphtalia and Filo, who has grown into a full grown filolial, are walking towards the capital at the moment. The previous day they had just finished the swamp training session, so they leave to Riyute for the night. However, when he looked through his status screen, he found asterisks after Raphtalia's name.

Once he saw that, he looked in his help screen and found that he could increase her level cap at the dragon hourglass. He then decided their next outing was going to be to the capital. It annoyed him since he didn't want to go back, but he won't let his grudges hold any of his party back from being as strong as possible.

Yuudai looks at her with a bored look. "Well I just looked through your stats and found this out." He explains simply. Filo lets out a noise from her mouth catching his attention. He looks at her finding the giant bird trying to gesture for him and Raphtalia to ride on her back. "It looks like we are getting a free ride, Raphtalia."

She smiles seeing this. Her feet have been aching for some time now, so she is not against this in the least. She is about to get on with Yuudai, but the two catch sight of the most unsightly people they could ever hope to see. That would be Motoyasu, Myne and many guards going in the direction of Riyute.

Yuudai sighs. "I hope they don't cause trouble while I'm gone." He says to himself.

"I actually think we should follow them to Riyute. To make sure they don't cause trouble." Raphtalia tells her friend.

"Give me a moment." Yuudai says using his ring's power. He disappears for a moment before reappearing with a scroll in hand. He opens it reading through it all. "Damn it." He mutters. "Apparently they are trying to appoint Yasu as the leader of Riyute."

"Then we have to go back and stop this!" Raphtalia exclaims earning an excited chip from Filo.

Yuudai sighs activating his wind control rune. Suddenly, Motoyasu, Myne and the guards are all floating in the air. They are all looking around panicking. Who could blame then? This happened out of nowhere.

Knowing they won't be going anywhere, Yuudai walks towards them with his two companions beside him. It takes them a few minutes, but they finally get to them. They all see Yuudai immediately instilling fear in all the guards. Yasu and Myne just glare at him.

Yuudai holds up the scroll for them to see wordlessly. Upon seeing that, they feel dread. "This is none of your business, Shield Devil!" Myne yells at the silent Shield Hero.

"This is a royal decree from his majesty!" Yasu exclaims. "For fighting off the wave!"

Yuudai keeps staring quietly at them. Apparently he is doing this due to the fact they'll let out more information if they assume what he is thinking. The point is he doesn't want to talk at the moment and they do.

"Once the king finds out about this, he'll have your wanted poster everywhere! You won't be accepted anywhere!" Myne shouts at him.

"I honestly can't believe she's still talking." Yuudai whispers to Raphtalia. "It's like she expects me to snap at her or something."

"Stop ignoring us!" Motoyasu exclaims again.

"What do you want me to say? How dare you? What do you think your doing?" Yuudai asks giving them a bored look. "I feel like I wore out these pointless things by now with you two. Only reason I stopped you two is to tell you that town will never belong to you, Yasu."

Myne grits her teeth in seething anger while Yasu blinks twice with a blank face. "I mean...I hate to admit it, but he isn't wrong about the pointless thing." Motoyasu admits.

"Don't agree with him!" Myne orders the Spear Hero angrily.

"So in light of not wanting to deal with any of you, I am going to leave you all with a warning." Yuudai states turning around. "Try to do anything concerning the town and I'll kill the guards, tear off Myne's arm then beat Motoyasu into a coma with the arm."

"You dare threaten royalty like that?" Myne growls out.

"You also wore out that habit." Yuudai says. "Threatening me when your very life is in my hands. Getting really dull."

He is about to deactivate his wind power, but a group of ninja looking people appear out of nowhere to most of them. Yuudai noticed them the moment they got in his sight a second ago. They actually impress him. He hasn't seen anyone near that speed in the entire time he has been in the new world.

One of the ninja looking people stand up while the others stay on one knee in a landing position from a jump. "I must ask you to drop the princess, Shield Hero." The voice of a woman states.

"Don't worry lady, I have other things to do and they have nothing to do with it." Yuudai tells them dropping the guards, Motoyasu and Myne to the ground. "My threat warning still stands."

With that, Yuudai and his two companions leave. They make it to the forest before Raphtalia finally speaks up. "I'm impressed, Yuudai. You didn't harm them this time around." She says happily.

"That's because it is starting to become nothing more than a back and forth verbal fight then I say something witty, they get upset and then I soundly beat them. Seriously, it's a cycle now."

From the branch of a tree, an Orange Balloon jumps at Yuudai. Yuudai slaps it away with his shield sending it at a tree. It bursts into strips of rubber upon contact.

"Kind of getting bored. Maybe going to get your level cap raised will bring something interesting up." Yuudai says shrugging. He reaches into his bag pulling out some wrapped up meat. The hero unwraps it to toss it to Filo.

He then reaches for the dried meat from the Chamera the village kept as food after Yuudai killed it. Yuudai offers some to Raphtalia, so she accepts the offer. The trio eat quickly so that they can continue on. Though, Filo finished hers in one gulp.

In a matter of an hour, they make it to the capital. They quickly notice the fact everyone is flinching at his presence. Everybody knows what happened when he was there the last time. He laid his hands on their king, hurt the princess and injured two of the other heroes. It is only natural for them to be unnerved by him.

The trio ignore this while making their way to the church in which the dragon hourglass resides. It is called the Church Of The Three Heroes. Yuudai already figured they are going to have disdain for him. Rinse and repeat.

The trio, including Filo, walk into the church finding some women in church wardrobe standing in front of the giant hourglass. "At least there is no priest here. Do you know why, Raphtalia?" Yuudai asks feeling a joking smile appear on himself.

She face palms herself. "Why do I feel like this joke is going to be at the church's expense?"

"That way the children don't have to be touched." He finishes up his joke laughing. Raphtalia groans as the women of the church frown at this. He notices this as well. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't say that...priestesses are just as capable of this."

"Keep this up and we won't be are to raise my level cap." Raphtalia reminds her friend.

"I know." Yuudai replies. "I just am trying to make this boring thing fun." He straightens up getting serious. "Hey church ladies, can you get my friend here's level cap raised?" He asks bluntly.

"That is impossible, Shield Devil." The top lady answers. "Not only do we not do business with the devil, there is a new law prohibiting you from this act. Decreed by the king recently."

Yuudai deadpans at all the ladies. He then starts looking around the place confusing everyone. After a few minutes he scratches the back of his head. "That's weird. I can't find any more sticks."

"Why would we have sticks laying around?" The top lady asks.

"For all your followers and the new ones. You know, the ones you shove up your-" He goes to insult, but Raphtalia shoots him a look. One telling him that it would be ultimately be pointless. "Fine. As your devil," He turns his shield into the Shadow Shield. "I will force you to do as I say."

The ladies of the church look amongst themselves. "Our answer is still the same." The top lady decides. Yuudai raises an eyebrow as one of the heads of the orthrus come out of the shield as a shadow creation. It bares its fangs at the top lady growling.

"You shouldn't say no to my boy here. After all, he's a good boy as long as you don't upset him." Yuudai states in a threatening manner.

"Without us, you won't even be able to increase her level cap. Now leave." She orders him pointing at the exit door.

Yuudai rolls his eyes changing the shield back to normal. The shadow creation disappears along with the shield. He puts his hands into his jacket pockets walking away.

"When the day you all need me comes, don't expect me to show up." Yuudai tells them being followed by Raphtalia and Filo.

The trio eventually arrive to the field outside the capital by dawn. Yuudai falls face first on the ground on purpose while sighing. "Uh, Yuudai? Are you alright?" Raphtalia asks sounding worried.

The shield hero rolls over onto his back looking at her. "I'm just very annoyed. An entire religion made to hating on the Shield Hero...what kind of crap is that? What did the last Shield Hero do?" He asks nobody in particular. "And why the hell are there ninjas following us?!" He yells glaring behind himself at the treeline.

Raphtalia is about to ask him what he means, but she hears retreating footsteps in the distance with her enhanced hearing. "How did you notice them?" Raphtalia asks him.

"Every time somebody is watching me, I feel their gaze. Normal feeling for most things. The difference between them and anybody else is that they give the feeling of general curiosity while most others give off hostility." He explains.

Filo chirps at him nestling beside him. Her feathers press against the hero surprising him. His surprise stems from the fact that the feathers are very soft and comforting. A sigh of comfort comes from his mouth for once.

"This is the most comfortable living pillow I have ever felt." Yuudai says nuzzling against the seemingly happy bird. The bird looks at the path where another filolial is pulling a cart chirping again. "Do you want a cart for yourself?" Yuudai asks his feathered friend.

One loud chirp confirms his question to be a yes. "How are we going to get her a cart?" Raphtalia asks him.

"I'll be gone for a few moments." Yuudai says standing up. "I'm going to pay someone to make a cart over in Riyute then come back. I suppose you two can take care of each other, right?"

Raphtalia straightens up with a proud smile. "Of course we can!" She answers as Filo chirps.

Yuudai turns his power on and leaves in that instant. Since Filo hasn't seen that trick yet, she stands up looking around. She chirps loudly probably calling out to him. The raccoon girl pets Filo's head comforting the creature.

"Don't worry, Filo. He'll be back soon." She tells the bird.

"How soon?" A certain voice asks. There is hostility evident in the voice.

Raphtalia whirls around to find three of the ninja looking people from earlier. However, they don't seem to be from the same group as earlier. They are all ready to strike at a moments notice. The raccoon girl stiffins feeling on edge now.

"If he doesn't come soon then our negotiations will end up with two dead bodies." The first ninja, Shadow as they're known, states emotionlessly.

"You won't-" She goes to retort, but the Shadow quickly is able to knock her to the ground with one punch to the face. Raphtalia had closed her eyes on impact as instinct, so when reopens her eyes ignoring the pain, she finds the Shadow standing over her holding a palm towards her.

"Your filolial won't be trouble, right?" The Shadow asks giving the curious creature a death glare.

The raccoon girl forces a smile for Filo calming the bird. "She won't be." She answers moving her hand slowly towards her sword. She is hoping to go unnoticed.

Wordlessly, one of the other Shadow create an air arrow shooting it through Raphtalia's wrist. A scream escapes Raphtalia's mouth piercing the air. Her scream of pain is covered up by the hand of the third Shadow.

"We made sure to do no permanent damage, but you won't be using your sword now." The Shadow standing over her says. Raphtalia looks over to Filo finding her unconcious. "While you were screaming, my partner knocked out your filolial." The Shadow explains.

"What do you want?" Raphtalia demands to know fighting against the tears.

"The Shield Hero. He has only five minutes to get here." The Shadow answers.

End

There we go! Incentive for you all to read on! Would you look at that? Anyway, answering things now!

Yes, I know I prevented the whole race thing. Could have done it, but I didn't see it worth it since Yuudai can literally beat Motoyasu on his feet in a race even if Yasu was on a dragon. And don't worry, I'll find a place to add in the crotch kick. If it's the last thing I do.

Next up, the biggest salt in the wound. Injuring of Raphtalia. Seeing as something happened in this chapter, that something decided to send the Shadows, pretty much assassins, intelligence acquirers, etc, for the higher ups, after Yuudai. And worry not, Raphtalia will soon remember her power.

Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	15. Attacked By Shadows

Welcome one and all! To the smallest event of the year! There won't be happy endings or quality anime of this, so come and read the spin off of Yuudai! Never gave him a last name though...wonder if I should do that one of these days.

Anyway, I am back with more action! As I'm more than sure of, you have noticed that there are more favorites, follows and reviews, so let's answer them!

RedBurningDragon: Oddly enough, I actually debated on who sent them. On one hand, he really blew off Myne and Motoyasu, but on the other hand, he did piss off the church. And yes, games and anime taught me the same lesson. Most are...if they are in a fantasy world or something.

Pinkdog16: I get it, I do. Some stories get boring after a while, so I understand.

BlueXtreme: Oh yes they and and yes he will.

OechsnerC: I thought I might as well make a leap of faith with my little thing I did there, so I did. Got a fair amount of good feedback.

Random Babbling: After they harmed Raphtalia? It's as likely as Yuudai obeying every order given by the king. As explained above, I debated, but I did decide. I'm going to say it here since I don't know if the Shadows will admit to anything. If the queen has sent them then yes, any kind of future contact would be futile. Thank you, I honestly enjoy writing this, so hearing that is awesome! And yeah, Yuudai isn't one for needless sadism for no reason, so it is dialed back (Plus this is rated T) for him.

Guest: That may be your opinion, but I can't ignore that by pretending nothing happened before. Especially when some things carry over into this story. If you care to read it, shameless advertising ahead, it is called The Fear Of Mages.

Chapter 15: Attack By Shadows

"Can you have it done by tomorrow?" Yuudai asks a man. He's a typical man from Riyute trying to find the funds to fix up some broken things from the wave that Yuudai couldn't prevent.

"Sorry, Shield Hero. I'd love to, but unless you can pay me, I can't do it." The man replies regretfully.

Yuudai smiles understandingly. "I can't blame you. I do have money though. How does one hundred silver sound?" Yuudai asks casually.

The man's eyes widen in surprise. "That's a whole gold coin! I can do that for you, but you should know that you can find someone that wouldn't charge you for anywhere near that much silver." The man tells him honestly.

"I know you and the entire town are in a state of being too poor, so as long as you share a little bit of silver with someone then I don't care." Yuudai replies smiling back at him.

He pulls out one hundred silver from his pouch of silver. The hero hands it all over confirming the creation of the cart. Once the money was handed over though, Yuudai gets a bad feeling. Actually, that is an understatement. It is a horrible feeling.

"Listen, I need to get going. Can you have it done by midday tomorrow?" Yuudai asks feeling the urge to hurry to his two companions.

"I can have it done by this time tomorrow at the latest." The man answers putting the silver in a small pouch that isn't used to holding more than ten silver coins at a time.

"Thank you." Yuudai thanks quickly leaving.

His horrible feeling is only growing, so he goes full speed to Raphtalia and Filo. The hero arrives, but stops many yards away. The hero's eyes are looking over Raphtalia bleeding from her wrist and an unconscious Filo. Standing over them are three ninjas, Shadows, similar to the group from earlier.

Yuudai grits his teeth forcing himself not to make any sudden movements. After all, one wrong move might convince them to kill the two. "What the hell is going on?" Yuudai asks angrily.

The one closest to Raphtalia walks a few feet closer to Yuudai making the tension grow more. Yuudai looks past the Shadow to make sure the other two are not moving. Once sure, the hero focuses back on the first.

"Answer my question before I rip you vocal cords out." Yuudai threatens glaring at the Shadow.

"One suspicious twitch and we kill your friend and filolial." The first Shadow states.

"Do that and hell won't be able to inflict as much pain as I will." Yuudai retorts.

Raphtalia looks at him from on the ground in a pleading manner. If her and Filo are killed, she knows Yuudai would start massacring all of Melromarc before the wave could even attempt it a third time. He then makes eye contact with her. The teen hero itches his hand hoping for her to notice.

"Here is the deal. You can let your friend and bird die or you will follow us to be burned alive." The Shadow states emotionlessly.

"Here's a better deal. You leave or die." Yuudai says smirking.

"Kill them." The Shadow orders.

"They disappeared." One of the other Shadow informs.

The Shadow doesn't turn around since the risk of dying with their back turned is very realistic. "So the girl had a trick up her sleeve." Quickly and without hesitation, two of them create a giant water dragon through magic. The extra Shadow infuses the dragon with electricity making the dragon made of water now electric ridden.

Yuudai's eyes widen as they throw the dragon right at him. He easily avoids it by jumping to the side, but it only comes back at him. "Homing dragon? That's stupid." Yuudai mutters deciding to aim for the Shadow people.

When he looks to where they were, they have already started coming at him with ice make weapons. The worst part is the fact they seem to be with poison along the entire sharp side of the blade. Yuudai's eyes widen as he changes his shield into the Sword Shield.

He blocks one sword with the shield part and dodge the others by whirling around the Shadow. Yuudai pushes the Shadow towards his dragon, but the Shadow catches itself avoiding it. The dragon thing continues to follow Yuudai as the three Shadows go at him attacking and waiting for one slip up.

With Raphtalia

Her breathing hitches again once she is finally in the the tree line. Her breathing has been giving her problems ever since she was able to grab Filo and use her gun to teleport away. She didn't want to leave, but she had to get Filo away from it all.

She falls to her knees feeling all her strength leave her. Her mind has been telling her how useless she is ever since Yuudai signaled for her to escape. Just as it had done when she was a slave to abusive masters.

"We will always love you, Raphtalia." She hears her parents tell her. Raphtalia turns her head around finding that the scenery has changed and she is younger. She finds herself standing again looking over them.

Her parents are in front of her while beside them is her old friend. Her dead friend. Raphtalia's eyes widen further knowing that Rifana wanted more than anything to meet the Shield Hero. Rafana even wished to marry him since she had heard the Shield Hero was always good to demi-humans.

"Don't leave him to die. Especially when he has done more for you than anyone since your parents." Rafana tells her friend.

"I know I shouldn't leave him!" Raphtalia retorts holding her head. "I don't want to hold him back though! Not when he distracted them enough for me to get away." Raphtalia looks closer at her friend seeing bruises, scars and injuries appear all over her body.

"He is being attacked. You can't let him handle all the problems when he is doing the right thing in a wrong world. Especially when he was taken from his own. Help him then help the demi-humans of the world whenever the time comes." Rafana says to Raphtalia.

Raphtalia nods finally gathering the courage to stand up and go. Her surroundings finally return to normal with her gun and sword in hand. She shoots in the direction where she left Yuudai leaving Filo behind for now.

With Yuudai

All around him is singed ground, wet dirt, craters and blood. In some areas, there are still embers of fire burning. In the middle of it all, Yuudai is standing with his Shadow Shield out. Across from him is the three Shadows. They are panting and more than definitely out of mana. All over them are covered in cuts and one of them has a broken arm.

Yuudai raises the shield creating a dark flame from a vortex. It shoots towards the three, but they once again dodge it. Yuudai can land blows on them, but as far as things are concerned right now, they aren't shocked from his shield anymore making their movements more instinctual and sudden. Their swords have been long since broken as well.

Yuudai quickly appears right next to the one with the broken arm. He proceeds to grab the Shadow's arm and starts to swing in circles. The teen then lets go of the Shadow throwing it (I'm calling the Shadows it since they are meant to not show gender) into the fire. The Shadow is finally incinerated as the vortex disappears.

"Finally got one of you bastards." Yuudai says feeling so satisfied. His eyes try to scan for the other two, but only one is in his vision. That specific one is panting still.

Suddenly, his instincts tell him to move, so he jumps forward while turning around midair. The Shadow tried to get him from behind. However, that same Shadow has a sword tip coming through where its heart is. The killer of the Shadow proves to be Raphtalia.

The teen hero doesn't have time to thank her as the other one is coming at him. Yuudai backflips over the Shadow switching to his Sword Shield. As soon as he lands, the hero shoots forward cutting the Shadow from its shoulders to waist. He switches the shield back to normal while the body of the Shadow falls in two.

For a few moments he stands there looking over the fighting grounds is on. The teen hero proceeds to sit on the ground. "Why did I keep underestimating them?" He asks himself thinking over the many times he had done so.

"Are you okay, Yuudai?" Raphtalia asks kneeling to check him over.

"I'm just fine." He replies looking at her. "How about Filo? Where is she?"

She jumps up shooting in the direction of her. Within the minute, Filo is sleeping right next to Yuudai. "Here she is." Raphtalia tells him smiling.

Yuudai turns his gaze to her wrist finding it is still bleeding. The hero reaches into his bag taking out a water bottle he bought from town, a potion and gauze. "Stay still." He tells her.

The raccoon girl nods knowing it needs to be done. He quickly washes away the majority of the blood, puts on the potion and wraps it in gauze. "The gauze is just there for show. I believe the potion will get rid of it soon." Yuudai says to her.

The two just lay on the ground on their backs sighing. "Who do you think sent them?" Raphtalia asks.

"No doubt the church. I can't imagine the idiotic princess would have access to these people or else she would have sent hundreds already." Yuudai reasons. He sighs looking between her and Filo. "We should leave Melromarc."

"What?!" Raphtalia exclaims surprised.

"If your life and hers was threatened by skilled assassins then I can't stand staying around here. Not until the next wave." Yuudai states deathly serious.

"Does this mean we are going to leave the kingdom of Melromarc to the other three heroes?" Raphtalia asks feeling down for some reason.

"That's what they have been wanting for a long while now, isn't it?" Yuudai asks with an edge to his voice. "Besides, what point is there to bringing down the church since others will rise up, each with more self righteous reason to kill us."

"We can't leave these innocent people to the higher ups who abuse their power!" Raphtalia exclaims. She puts her hands on her hips. "I've backed down from them for too long. I won't let them push you away either."

Yuudai frowns at her. "The only way I'll have us stay here is if you promise to be stronger. Strong enough to single handedly kill five of them without being seriously injured." He says.

"Then that's exactly what I'll do! You will teach me to use my power more wisely and show me faults in my actions!" She states determined.

Seeing the determination in her, his mind is actually telling him to give in to her. A sigh escapes his lips. "As long as you stick to this, we will stay in Melromarc for until after the next wave."

"Just watch, I'll make sure I'm strong enough to take on an army of them one day." She tells him smirking.

Yuudai rolls his eyes unable to keep a smile from forming on his face. "If that is your goal then mine to take on the entire world." He retaliates. Filo wakes up chirping. Yuudai shoots the oversized bird a smile. "Don't worry, you'll be strong too, one day."

End

Here is the end! Sorry for the shorter than normal chapter, but I don't think dragging this out would be smart. Then again, I know you all don't want this dragged out.

How was it? I thought it was pretty good. Then again, self bias opinions are my specialty. Now on to other matters. Holy crap! I now have over a one hundred and fifty followers and nearly the same amount of favorites! That's insane! For me.

Anyway, without my useless banter, thank you for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	16. The Transforming Filolial

Yo my friends! How are you all doing? Me? I was doing good until I realized that a wendigo has been stalking me since five years ago. What? I used the wendigo thing before? Nah, you're crazy.

Anyway, how are you all doing? I hope you are all doing well. If the enormous fan base I have gathered is anything to go by. Thank you to all my new and old favoriters and followers! Let's get to them reviews!

DreitXG: Yeah, you know her. I might have screwed up her name though, so sorry.

RedBurningDragon: Yes, but you must think inside Yuudai's overpowered mind. If he would have used that trick against potential threats like them then he could be screwed over. After all, there were other Shadows from earlier, remember?

Guest 1: Exactly! It's foolproof! Other than the cockroaches...they won't die...damn bugs.

Guest 2: I know, but he isn't a complete idiot. As proven in this chapter. He relents, but he is going to be far away.

OechsnerC: Thank you. That isn't a bad guess. He might fall under its influence at first since it'll likely catch him off guard, but he also is mentally strong.

Guest 3: I have yet to read it all. I'm going to start reading it soon.

Kyred: As always!

Otaku0040: Why thank you very much. I thought about that, but then I considered it is just my original character with the occasional Familiar Of Zero memories.

marcano321: Yeah! Sorry I can't answer all of your things, but just know, I read them all. Shall we add to the excitement? Let's!

Chapter 16: The Transforming Filolial

"Why are we traveling so far away from Melromarc?" Raphtalia asks her friend. "I thought you agreed to stay here."

Yuudai looks back at her with a bored look. "I said we'd stay in this country, not near that damned town." He says to her.

Filo chirps happily while pulling their carriage. They have been on the carriage since that morning. The man had finished it quicker than he thought, so they could go quicker. More than that, Filo had gotten bigger again.

"You may want that training, but as long as you are in potential danger then I won't let it near us." Yuudai tells her. A loud bark breaks through the sky causing Yuudai to become curious.

Filo, Yuudai and Raphtalia look up to find a large winged dog coming at them. None of them really become fearful though. After what they've seen, it's only intriguing.

"Would you look at that. A hainu." Yuudai says jumping off the carriage. Raphtalia jumps off after him pulling out her sword. They are all in the middle of an open plain, so it isn't a complete surprise, seeing as it is one of its habitats. "Your problem."

Raphtalia sweat drops. "What if it attacks you?" She asks.

The hainu growls and tries to bite Yuudai, but he easily maneuveres around it. He then hides behind Raphtalia. "Then you simply attack it. After all, I'm the Shield Hero. I'm not meant to fight."

The hainu turns to the two growling at them. "It sounds like an excuse to me." Raphtalia retorts readying her sword.

"Look at it another way. You'll be getting our meal for lunch." Yuudai reasons avoiding letting her know he doesn't feel like doing it himself.

Raphtalia sighs starting her sprint at the dog. She swings her sword for its throat, but it flaps its wings sending her back a few feet. Out of nowhere, Filo kicks its head knocking it off. Yuudai and Raphtalia stare at the filolial with wide eyes.

"Best pokemon ever." Yuudai states making Raphtalia facepalm herself.

The bird chirps loudly pushing the dead body towards Raphtalia and Yuudai. The two sweat drop chuckling at the same time. Soon the three are eating the cooked body of the creature Filo killed.

"So what's our plan if we're not staying near Melromarc?" Raphtalia asks still disappointed they didn't brave out the attacks.

Yuudai shrugs taking a bite from the meat. "Probably stay near the borders. That way we can train in peace and not be bothered too much." He replies. The teen then lays on his back.

Raphtalia gives him a blank stare. "You don't know at all, do you?" She asks calling him out.

Yuudai looks away from her stubbornly. His face then turns right back towards Raphtalia very red. "When did we decide to bring a naked little girl with us?" He asks blushing all the way to his ears.

Raphtalia rolls her eyes. "You're not getting out of answering the question, Yuudai." She says not believing him. Actually it's more like she doesn't want to. It'd be super weird if there was actually an naked little girl with them.

"Look to where Filo was." Yuudai tells her.

She reluctantly turns her head finding a naked little girl with angel wings on her back. They are fairly small, but they are white. Raphtalia's face becomes full red right along with Yuudai.

The girl looks at them giving the brightest most innocent smile ever. "What's wrong?" She asks in a sweet voice.

"You mean beside the fact you are naked and you…" Yuudai trails off realizing something. "You're Filo."

Raphtalia looks closer realizing the same thing. "How can a filolial change into this?" She asks.

Yuudai deadpans at her. "You're really going to ask that? After all you've been through, that's what surprises you?" He says almost disappointed.

"It's a little girl! Even I have to be surprised." Raphtalia retorts crossing her arms and pouting.

"Is there anymore?" Filo asks stepping closer to Yuudai.

Yuudai takes off his cloak and hands it to her. "Put that on and I promise you can eat the rest of the meat." Yuudai reasons still not looking at her.

"Yay!" Filo cheers putting on the cloak. Within the minute, she has almost all the meat gone.

Raphtalia stares at the little girl with a slack jaw. "What kind of metabolism does that girl have?" She asks her friend. She looks to Yuudai finding him looking very serious. "What's wrong?"

"Despite your plea, we might not stay in this kingdom." Yuudai tells her bluntly. Before Raphtalia can say anything, Yuudai holds a hand up. "I was willing to teach you, but I'm not willing to risk the life of Filo. Look at her." He tells her. Raphtalia looks at the little blond girl. "She was almost killed and we thought it was just an ordinary filolial."

Raphtalia remembers this happening. When Filo was almost killed by those Shadows. The raccoon girl sighs nodding. "You're...you're right. But neither of us know where we could go."

"Then we'll travel in a random direction until we find somewhere to stay." Yuudai says simply. He frowns. "Then again, it might be too difficult going near any towns now."

"Why do you say that?" Raphtalia asks him. He gives her one look making her realize what he means. "So they'll have our faces on posters until we are dead."

Yuudai nods in confirmation. "We could have hid the bodies, but that...would have made sense." Yuudai says thinking over the possibility. "That probably would have saved trouble, but we also made a mess of the field, so it would have been questioned and pinned on us still."

Raphtalia nods thinking over the drawbacks as well. "It can't be helped."

"Then there's the fact we have Filo...not exactly clothed." Yuudai adds refusing to look at her.

"We could find something that works if we went back to the city. By now they know we had already started to leave. We could fake them out." Raphtalia suggests.

"I love the fact you're using your head, but we won't be going back. Not until I have a solid plan of action that doesn't involve you two getting hurt." Yuudai replies casually. He then sighs.

Raphtalia smiles a little bit for him. "Knowing you, that'd be impossible." She states.

"That's the problem." Yuudai points out. "While you are strong, you rely on my power for the stronger enemies."

Raphtalia looks to the ground knowing this to be true. "I know, that's what I hope to fix through our training."

"Done!" Filo exclaims laying back happily on the ground.

Raphtalia and Yuudai look over to find the entirety of the meat gone. In just barely a minute. The two can't help but sweatdrop. "At least she's isn't hungry anymore." Raphtalia says quietly chuckling.

The little blond girl rubs her stomach happily. "Maybe I could eat a bit more." She says dreamily.

Yuudai commedicly glares at Raphtalia. He then points menacingly at her. "If thou dareth jinx thee, thou shall feed the birdy." He says half confusing and alarming Raphtalia.

"Shouldn't we find her some clothing first?" Raphtalia asks sweat dropping.

"Probably." Yuudai replies becoming serious. He brings a hand to his chin beginning to think up a plan. He stands up taking off his cloak and hands it to Filo. "Wear this. I don't want you transforming with it on though." Yuudai tells his new comrade.

She nods still smiling. Filo quickly puts it on covering up her nudity now. "Oh thank god, she's clothed." Raphtalia thanks under her breath.

Yuudai turns to his raccoon girl partner quickly. "Wait, god is an actual concept in this world?" Yuudai quickly asks. She nods slowly. The teen boy sighs with relief. "Finally! Last world I was at, before my own, was very confusing. They kind of considered a guy named Brimier god, but always had an underlying tone that they believed in a god, but made it so confusing."

"You mean Yuudai-sama isn't god?" Filo asks making a giant grin appear on Yuudai's face and causes Raphtalia to laugh nervously.

Yuudai slowly turns to his bird girl. "I'm not god, Filo. However, please continue to call me Yuudai-sama from now on." He tells her.

"I almost thought you were going to have her call you god or something." Raphtalia says honestly. Yuudai gives her an amused look before becoming serious again.

Yuudai quickly looks around their surroundings finding nothing out of the ordinary. He then pulls out a map from his bag looking it over. "If we take the road we'd end up at a city, but it would lead through. But if we were to avoid it altogether it'd take a couple more useless days of nothing but riding through a field." Yuudai mutters deciding on their route to the edge of the border. "It'd also mean less of a chance of arguing with a bunch of people."

Raphtalia stands up walking to his side. "If we move quick enough then we might be able to pass through before any wanted posters arrive." She informs him hoping it is true.

"Why is another one of those damn ninjas here?" Yuudai questions putting the map away.

Filo and Raphtalia become slightly frightened looking around quickly. They find one kneeling before them from behind. "I'm impressed, Shield Hero." The Shadow admits sounding honestly impressed.

Yuudai turns around frowning. "Cut the crap and tell me why you're here alone." Yuudai orders. After his last encounter, he isn't exactly a fan of them.

"The queen of Melromarc has sent me to express her sincerest apologies. We are aware of what transpired as of your arrival to now and wish to let you know that she does not condone such horrible things." The Shadow explains to him without any malice or any other emotion for that matter.

Filo gets behind Yuudai while Raphtalia stays in place tensed up still. Yuudai sighs shaking his head. "If she's sorry then I will accept it for now. Just tell her that I trust her as much as I trust her daughter." He replies. Raphtalia nods in agreement.

The Shadow nods understandingly. "Before I leave, the queen has a couple requests."

"What are they?" Yuudai asks crossing his arms.

"To save the village you are going to pass by. It is plagued by plant monsters and then clean up dragon remains that is in the mountains that is a day and a halfs trip by your carriage." She answers. "Do not worry, the queen will reward you and your companions for the deeds."

Yuudai looks between his two companions. "This could work in multiple ways." Yuudai mutters to himself. He smirks at the two then becomes straight faced as he turns to the Shadow. "Alright then. For the reward, I want her to have a very durable blind fury stick sword made and clothing that won't tear apart on my filolial here." He says patting Filo's head.

"That can be arranged." The Shadow replies quickly disappearing before their eyes. Yuudai could easily see her leave, but he is used to his higher speeds.

"Looks like we have ourselves a course of action." Yuudai states smirking.

"Why didn't you ask for anything for yourself?" Raphtalia asks knowing for a fact he didn't get that sword for himself.

"Because I don't need anything." Yuudai answers packing his things back on the carriage. "Now let's pack up and get moving. Before we lose the motivation to do anything."

End

Here we are! Finished the chapter! Sorry for how short it is. I only have the reason of not uploading in so long. I'll try to keep my updates quicker, but I have others too. I am thinking of doing a new one, but I might not since it might screw with my others.

Explanations! So this chapter was about them figuring out their next move, so that happened. Sorry it was uneventful, but forcing out fight scenes wouldn't exactly be good for it. Speaking of readers, holy crap! So many of you like this story! I love it!

So what do you think of the new sword Raphtalia will be using? Look it up if you want. I think she'd like it very much. For Filo, I couldn't have them going into town since I don't see him dealing with them any time soon.

Who's looking forward to Yuudai's future endeavors? I sure am! Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	17. The Living Vines

Welcome back to my creation of the written variety! Want to know a random fact? No? Oh...too bad! NF is an amazing musician!

Anyway, how have you all been? I hope you've been well since we all like feeling good while reading a story. Thank you to all of you lovely people that favorited and followed this! As always, let's get to them reviews!

Guest 1: Hmm...maybe. I don't know since Yuudai wouldn't let Filo get hurt like that.

OechsnerC: Thank you as always!

Rmarcano321: Quite the loaded gun I see. Well I don't want to change the entire series to the point of changing their names, so I'd rather keep it as is. She'll probably appear earlier than in the anime or books, but we'll see. Because Yuudai already has experience in fighting and knows what a kingdom should look like adding credibility to his claim that the kingdom sucks. In terms of personality, Yuudai is more driven by his amusement and by his beliefs. If he feels the need to do something then he might do it. Among other things, he is also more laid back...sometimes. In terms of power, Yuudai has combat experience he learned from his father, mentioned in The Fear Of Mages. He also has gained the power of the wind later on in that series as well as having the Shadow Shield which is fairly self explanatory.

Guest 2: I'm glad it does! I think...

Chapter 17: The Living Vines

"So your village has been overtaken by a vine monster that was simply supposed to be weed killer?" Yuudai asks pinching the bridge of his nose.

A middle aged man stands in front of him at the moment looking very nervous. "Y-yes." He answers.

They are in a small camp outside the walls of their city where vines are rapidly showing over the top of the wall. It is very alarming for all the residents in that small camp. The worst part is the disappointment this random adventurer is showing. It just seems to make him feel stupid.

"By the Spear Hero?" Yuudai questions getting a nod this time. "That damn idiot." Yuudai mutters.

"Are you going to help us?" The man asks with a small amount of hope in his voice.

"That's why me and my companions are here. To help you with this problem." Yuudai replies turning towards the entrance. Beside him is Filo in her bird form and Raphtalia.

"Thank you so much, adventurer!" The man thanks bowing to him.

Yuudai silently walks towards the entrance opening the door quickly and letting Raphtalia and Filo in. He then closes the door while looking over the soon to be battlefield. There is vines in almost every area and on every building.

"I wonder if they ever thought of using some kind of weed killer." Yuudai says out loud. He then puts his hand to his chin. "Is weed killer a thing in this world?"

"Why wouldn't weed killer exist in this world?" She asks giving him a bored look.

The teen boy just shrugs. "To be fair, as far as I know, radios don't even exist here."

"What's a radio?" Filo asks tilting her bird head.

"It's a device that projects sound from a speaker even though the speaker may be fifty miles away." Yuudai explains.

Yuudai's body suddenly tells him to move, so he does to find poison was just seemingly shot at him. He looks in the direction it came from finding a plant getting ready to spit more at him. Yuudai dodges again then notices a lot of them have different fruits on them.

The teen uses his speed to run over, take an apple from one then jumps onto one of the roofs while avoiding the acidic and poison spitting plants. "I wonder if it's edible." Yuudai wonders out loud.

He suddenly hears the battle cry of his two companions bringing him out of his easily wandering thoughts. Filo and Raphtalia are wasting no time in cutting down the plants with her sword and Filo's talons. The process is fairly slow considering all the attacks coming their way.

Yuudai watches the plants quickly grow more of themselves. He looks to his side witnessing the creation of a humanoid plant creature that's called Plantriwe. Its body is all vines and can no doubt do some damage.

The plant is about to attack him until its body is instantly cut to pieces. Under Yuudai's glove, the wind rune is glowing again. Meaning he used the air to cut it to pieces. The teen sighs as it comes back together as well as birthing a second one.

"Are you telling me that you're trying to go all greek hydra on me?" He asks rhetorically. His shield changes to the Shadow Shield as he opens one of the vortexes. It quickly spews fire turning the two Plantriwe to ashes. "Not on my watch."

He changes the shield back to normal after closing the vortex. The teen looks back to Raphtalia and Filo finding the two are doing well too. Raphtalia runs at one of the Mandragora, the acid and poison spitting plants, elegantly cutting it to pieces. Filo runs past the raccoon girl cutting up the next one.

"Let's try avoiding the vines and head towards the center of the city!" Yuudai yells to the two. "I believe that is where the root of our problem is!"

Despite the danger of their surroundings, Raphtalia gives him a disappointed look. "Must you make such jokes?"

"Yes!" Yuudai yells grinning.

Without another word, the three start to ignore them in favor for dodging and running for the center of the city. For each plant that gets in his way, he uses the air to cut them so that he can pass by. The two on the ground do the same thing except Raphtalia uses her sword and Filo uses her talons.

They soon find the cause of the whole problem. It seems to be a tree, but it is just vines all tightly wrapped together. Its name is Bioplant, unsurprisingly. Near the base, a huge eye opens creeping the trio out.

"That's not right." Yuudai says stopping in his tracks. The teen tries to think of what it reminds him of. "It reminds me of an Jubokko except this thing has an eye and lots of grunts."

"Yuudai-sama, I'm going for it!" Filo shouts out to him.

"Be careful Filo!" He tells her. Yuudai then changes his shield into the Rope Shield. He quickly wraps one of the Plantriew with the rope. Yuudai starts spinning around gaining speed then lets go of the Plantriwe sending in the direction of the giant eye.

Filo sees this as a chance, so she jumps and uses the creature as a platform. She jumps off it closing in on the eye. The giant bird raises its foot then brings it down across the eye. A gushing sound erupts from it causing Raphtalia and Yuudai to cringe.

Filo lands on the ground proceeding to jump back while avoiding enemy attacks. Despite being just attacked, the eye regenerates, but not before Yuudai notices an orb-like thing inside the center of the eye. "There's the weakness that I'm looking for." Yuudai mutters.

His ring's power activates quickly turning some of his hair blue. As if disappearing and reappearing, Yuudai is instantly in front of eye with his arm already inside it. The boy pulls his arm out clutching the orb in his hand. Yuudai crushes it causing an unimaginable shriek to come from the Bioplant.

The vines that make up the creature stop moving around as well as grow brown and welt. All around them, the plant creatures are doing the same. In no time, the huge tree thing starts to fall apart. Yuudai is quickly by Raphtalia's side.

"Well that was easier than I thought." Raphtalia says offhandedly. Just after she says this, many different seeds appear on the ground.

"Spoke too soon." Yuudai states walking over to them ready to absorb some of the seeds.

"Can I eat some of the fruits, Yuudai-sama?" Filo asks. Yuudai looks around finding that the fruits are the only ones to actually stay fresh.

"Go right ahead." He replies getting a happy chirp from her.

Later

"So you already finished it?" The middle aged man asks the trio of adventurers. The three nod. "What can we do to pay you back?"

Yuudai puts a hand on his chin. "Well you can give us some food for the road. As you might know, there isn't exactly any restaurants in the middle of an open field." He answers jokingly.

The man chuckles hearing the joking tone. "I know very well. Don't worry, we may not have money, but we certainly have enough food." The middle aged man says. "Thanks to you three, we won't have to leave our town! On behalf of everyone, thank you!"

The sincere thanks from the man brings a smile to Yuudai and Raphtalia's faces. "It was no problem." Yuudai responds happily. "However, we are needed in another town that's in danger as well, so if you could hurry with everything, I'd appreciate it very much."

"We will try to hurry for your sake." The man informs getting some help from the town's people.

"Our next step is cleaning up dragon remains up in the mountain." Raphtalia says out loud. She sighs knowing this is exactly the type of thing Yuudai would enjoy.

Yuudai turns to his friend with a straight face. "It won't be that simple."

She tilts her head curiously. "Why do you say that?"

"If it were that easy, don't you think it would have been taken care of already?" Yuudai replies quickly looking over the group of people packing up spare fruits in crates. "If I'm right, those remains contain a living dragon rather than a dead one."

"Way to make things seem better." Raphtalia says sarcastically.

"Your carriage is ready, heroes!" The middle aged man informs the trio.

Yuudai smiles at the man once again. "Thank you." He thanks starting his walk to the carriage.

As the three get ready, the town's people are all waving and yelling their thanks. "Motoyasu really knows how to cause problems." Raphtalia states once they have been on the road for a few hours.

Yuudai opens one of his closed eyes. Seeing as Filo actually knows where she is going, he doesn't really see the need to keep an eye on her. "You think he is the cause of the dragon problem?" Yuudai asks her calmly.

She shakes her head. "No. I simply mean that he is always causing problems for us in the past." She clarifies. "I can't see Motoyasu actually being able to defeat a dragon let alone find one."

Yuudai chuckles from her words. "You have a good point, Raphtalia." He admits. The teen then looks up into the sky about to lose himself in thought.

"I'm going to have to ask you all to stop." A voice shouts from a good distance.

Yuudai and Raphtalia focus their attention to farther down the road finding a group of people smirking. There are twenty in total. The one that spoke is in the center with a scar running down his face in one long line. It seems he has seen his fair share of fights.

"Unless you all would prefer to die." The apparent thug states.

"Want us to take care of this?" Raphtalia asks readying herself.

As if the air has rejected them, the entire entourage are all swept aside for miles away from the road. "Take care of what?" Yuudai asks innocently. His wind rune has already stopped glowing.

The raccoon girl deadpans at him again. "Do you really have to use your powers on useless things rather than important matters?" She asks.

"To be fair, you two need to keep your energy conserved until we get to the dragon. If I'm right, we won't be leaving without killing a dragon." Yuudai tells her without his usual casual replies. He then grows an excited smile. "Finally...I'm going to fight a real dragon!"

"If we die, we are going to haunt you for eternity." Raphtalia states comically.

Yuudai waves his hand dismissively. "I'm sure you two will be fine."

"Don't jinx us like that!" She yells feeling more than a little nervous.

"I can't wait to show that dragon whose boss!" Filo exclaims happily as well.

"You are the best bird I've ever known!" Yuudai tells Filo.

"Don't encourage each other!" Raphtalia shouts at the two still comical.

End

There we are! We finally finished one more chapter! I'm sorry for the delay, but I assure you, I haven't given up on this story!

I don't think there is much to explain. Other than the killing of the Bioplant. In the light novels and anime, there was an orb at the center of the eye, so I'd imagine if it were to be crushed, it'd kill it just as effectively as weed killer would.

I hope I have done as well as you all have come to expect! Without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	18. The Dead Dragon

SEASON TWO AND THREE?! A VIDEO GAME?! LET'S HEAR A CHEER FOR OUR BOY, GIRL, GIRL AND GIRL! AND THEIR ARMY!

Anyway, how have you all been? Sorry for such a long wait. I've been attempting original stories lately and didn't work on these much. However, I'm not finished yet! Thank you to everyone new and old for following and favoriting this story! Let's start the reviews, hmm?

Guest 1: Well no...he does not. Not yet.

rmarcano321: Indeed, but it was plants. Nothing cool about them, in my humble opinion. The inspiration was when I thought that he'd fit well. A defiant, somewhat stupid, very strong and good leader sounded good. Plus, Yuudai could possibly teach the heroes to be better ones...hopefully. At this part of the story, millions of times stronger. However, I'm doubtful that Yuudai could survive a direct hit from his Blood Sacrifice attack.

OechsnerC: Thanks! By the way, here it is!

Guest 2: Thank you!

doraemax: The next one, yes. At worst, he will still be sore.

fractalman: Thank you, first of all. Next, I know this. I do try to avoid these things, but sometimes I overlook things. I will try going back to rewrite chapters one these days in my free time, but I can't promise when.

Chapter 18: The Dead Dragon

"How much potions do we have?" Yuudai asks feeling bored.

The carriage has been on the road for hours now. Raphtalia has laying in the back with their supplies since they left. She looks around slowly. The raccoon girl isn't feeling very motivated to do anything.

"Looks like we have fifteen." Raphtalia answers laying her head back down afterwards.

"I thought we had twenty." Yuudai says looking back at her.

"Filo got thirsty." Filo admits happily. Both Raphtalia and Yuudai deadpan at the bird driving their carriage.

"I swear to whatever is watching over me that I am going to go broke to this damn pokemon." Yuudai groans falls on his side on the seat.

Raphtalia lays back down unwilling to respond to him. Not exactly something to respond to. Especially when the boy has a habit of talking to himself. The trio remain silent as they make their way towards a mountain. It is fairly close signifying that he is almost towards their destination.

"So if the dragon happens to have offspring or is still alive, what do we do?" Raphtalia asks wanting there to be more noise than just wheels going along the ground.

Yuudai sits back up. "Simple, we kill it again or we kill the offspring. No matter which, we will still get tons of experience." He answers casually.

"You expect a lot from us, don't you?" Raphtalia questions again.

"Absolutely." He replies.

"Hey, stranger!" A fairly young looking man calls out from the bottom of the mountain they are going to be going up soon.

Yuudai holds up one finger to the guy. A gesture for him to wait. A few minutes later, they are next to the guy. The teen jumps off the carriage to talk. After all, he doesn't seem to be a bandit or thief.

"I wouldn't go up there if I were you, traveler." The man advises laying down a traveling bag he was carrying.

Yuudai puts his hands in his pockets. "Why would that be?"

"You haven't heard?" He asks getting a blank expression from Yuudai. "A day or two ago, the rotting corpse of the dragon, the one that the Sword Hero killed, was never disposed of. Now it's toxic fumes have spread across the mountain, even the small village I was living."

Yuudai's face becomes contorted into an annoyed expression. "Did anyone die yet?"

"I'm unsure, but I am positive that some might as well be knocking on Death's door." He answers easily.

"Damnit, Ren." He mutters finally having a reason to assault the guy. Yuudai shakes his head giving the man a straight faced look. "If you are a patient man, then camp out at a village nearby or something. I'll have this placed fixed up soon, so I'd say wait two days before coming back. Just to be sure the fumes are gone."

The man nods his head. "If you could do that, I'd be very grateful." He says, but it is clear he doesn't believe he will. The man takes out three white cloths handing them to Yuudai. "Take these and make sure to use them to cover your mouths and noses. It should help a little bit."

"Thank you." Yuudai thanks.

The man picks up his bag then starts walking away. Raphtalia walks to Yuudai's side receiving one of the cloth. "We aren't going to hunt Ren down after this, are we?" Raphtalia asks putting the cloth in her pocket.

"That depends on how bad the situation is." He replies getting back on the carriage along with Raphtalia. "If somebody has died because of him... somebody best pray for him."

With Ren

"Pray for him." An odd voice says out of nowhere.

The black haired hero, having a bad feeling, looks around. His companion, Itsuki, looks around too. The two find an older woman looking at Ren as if fearing for him. She closes her eyes starting a prayer. The two, and their parties, are in a nearby kingdom trying to break their horrible government regime.

"Isn't that lady supposed to be able to tell when misfortune is about to fall upon someone?" Itsuki asks. Ren shrugs uncaringly.

Back With Yuudai

"I can see the corpse already." Yuudai announces to his friends.

Raphtalia nods seeing it at the same time. It isn't very hard to ignore. Especially when it has a strong presence just oozing off. It's like it is still a living creature. Which the trio already figured out.

"I can't believe that ninja lady wants us to kill some kind of zombie dragon." Yuudai says jumping off the wagon with Raphtalia. He then unhooks the carriage from Filo.

Filo's gaze is fixed solely on the dragon corpse. She seems to hate it more than the teenage teen imagined. He tilts his head.

"Don't tell me you actually don't know…" Raphtalia asks realizing Yuudai doesn't know.

"Know what?" He asks.

Right after his question, the dragon rises growling at the trio. It's gaze is mostly on Filo, but it isn't ignoring Yuudai and Raphtalia. Filo quickly jumps into action. She jumps from rock to rock attempting to disorient the reptile.

She then jumps at it's rotting back, but is quickly slapped away by its tail. The giant bird slams against a slab of rock leaving spiderline cracks in it. The dragon pulls its head back ready to let loose some kind of breath.

Yuudai rushes over already summoning his shadow shield to absorb it. It releases to reveal a poison type breath. The teen frowns watching some waft over towards Raphtalia.

The raccoon girl coughs lightly then pulls out her sword. "This sitting on the sidelines stuff sucks." She states rushing towards the undead dragon. "Filo's species have instinctual rivalry with dragons! So keep her from doing something stupid!" She orders her friend.

The teen boy shoots Filo a blank look. "That makes sense." He shakes his head.

Raphtalia makes it close enough to the dragon jumping at it. She cuts across it's neck stopping the poison breath from coming out of its mouth. However, the breath shoots out its neck wound pushing her away. She summons her shadow gun then shoots at the area beside Yuudai.

He looks at her nodding. "Smart move." He tells her. Both of them know that if she would have stayed, she would have inhaled a fatal amount of poison.

Yuudai looks to his side in time to watch Filo rush towards the dragon. Yuudai starts running toward the dragon changing his shield to the sword and activating his Ring's power. Raphtalia starts running as well starting an all out attack.

The dragon tries to move around, but the blue streak haired teen had cut off its feet by the ankles. In mid fall, Filo kicks its head hard enough to knock it over. Raphtalia slashes its eyes blinding the creature. It lets out an ear slitting roar forcing Yuudai, Raphtalia and Filo to cover their ears.

Yuudai's eyes widen as his vision becomes full of lines and circles that seem to glow red. He then grits his teeth activating his wind rune. In that instant, the entire dragon was cut into pieces. The teen notices the lines and circles are gone afterwards.

From the remains of the dragon, a shining purple gem is glowing, catching everyone's attention. He uses the wind to carry it over to him. He puts it in his pocket deciding to check it later. Along with assessing his weird vision.

"I thought that'd be much more difficult." Raphtalia states sheathing her blade.

Yuudai shrugs looking around for anything else. "I have to agree." He admits switching to his Shadow Shield. He summons the vortex incinerating all of the remains. "Now we have to visit the village to see if we can help somehow."

"Filo is upset." Filo mutters pouting.

"Why?" Yuudai questions turning to her.

"Filo wanted to kill it." She responds walking towards the carriage.

"Maybe I'll let you finish the next one off." Yuudai tells her.

The trio immediately head down to the village on the mountain side. As soon as they arrive, they find an older lady outside one of the houses. "Hey, is there anyone dead?"

The woman stares at Yuudai with a disturbed look. It isn't really surprising though. How many strangers ask if anyone has died? However, she assumes it must be about the fumes.

"Not yet, but if the townspeople don't get help soon, I'm afraid that will change." She replies to him.

Yuudai gathers up some potions and gives them to the woman. "These should help until the fumes die down." He states. He then gets back on the carriage. "Sorry I can't stay very long, I have to meet up with someone."

Like that, the trio left for the base of the mountain. Filo stops the carriage turning into her human form. Yuudai quickly throws her a cloak to cover herself up in. He then sets up a fire.

Raphtalia raises an eyebrow at this. "Why are you in such a rush today, Yuudai?" She asks getting his attention.

He looks at her with a firm stare. "I have some things to think about along with enemies coming for us soon since I used that shield again." He explains. A sigh escapes his lips. "I'd have loved to stay there longer, but too much is going to do so."

"He is quite right, Miss Raphtalia." A Shadow agrees appearing seemingly out of nowhere.

Raphtalia and Filo both flinch. The raccoon girl unknowingly reaches for her wrist. If the Shadow noticed this, the person ignored it.

The Shadow hands the blind fury sword to Yuudai plus the Filo's new clothing. It is a white dress with angel wings on the back. The boy deadpans at it.

"Why an angel outfit?" He questions handing it to Filo to change into.

"I gave the clothing shop exact details of your filolial's height, width, personality and they had it made." She responds without any emotion whatsoever.

Raphtalia and Yuudai look at each other then back to the Shadow. "Anyway, thanks."

The Shadow nods disappearing from sight. Raphtalia and Yuudai look at Filo finding that the outfit really does suit her. Raphtalia smiles at the bird girl while the teen boy delves into his thoughts.

"What could that have meant? It couldn't have been that thing breaking my defense. Even if I only had a Shield Hero status, I would have been able to tank it." He thinks out loud. Both girls hear him thanks to their sensitive hearing.

"What do you mean, Yuudai-sama?" Filo ask skipping over to him with an innocent look to her. He briefly marvels at how fitting the dress looks on her.

He smiles at her slightly. "I'll let you know when I figure that out." He tells her. The teen looks to the side finding creatures made of rock plus some slime creatures rolling towards them. Roughly thirty of them each. "You stupid Shadow Shield, you brought rock creatures. Filo, you get the rock ones and Raphtalia and I will get the slime."

Filo happily transforms into her bird form taking off. Raphtalia runs off towards the slime slicing away while Yuudai switches to his Sword Shield. His eyes catch sight of a rock creature about attack Filo from behind, so he moves right in front of it. He swings the shield part at it sending it far away in many different Rocky pieces.

The battle doesn't take too long as after that. He finally looks at their level finding he is maxed out already already. He sighs knowing he probably won't class up for a long time. So all he can do is perfect his skills.

"On the bright side, this didn't turn into some kind of echi crap." Yuudai says looking at his raccoon friend that happens to be a girl. To his relief, her clothing is all intact. He walks to the fire deciding their next course of action. "Who wants to find a hotspring without our faces everywhere?"

Both girls run over looking pretty excited. "Yes!" They both reply.

Filo then becomes confused. "What's a hotspring?"

End

There we go! Finally finished! I almost thought it wouldn't be done for much longer. Surprise to me and you all, I guess.

I hope you all liked it! If it wasn't obvious, Yuudai is using the hotspring as an excuse to keep them safe while he thinks over that thing. Which is as you may guess.

The dragon was never going to be a problem. Even if it had almost eaten Filo, Yuudai would have been too quick on his feet. So let's hope for some development next chapter, hmm?

Anyway, without much else to say, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


	19. To The Hot Springs

Ah, this feels nice. Just me, myself and I doing nothing...feels nice. Ah! Looks like you all have arrived! I...uh... it's not what it looks like!

Anyway, welcome back! Glad to see you all returned! I know it's been...wait. it hasn't been months? Huh. Perhaps I should wait longer next time. Thank you to everyone that favorited and followed! Let's check them reviews!

rmarcano321: Quite right, ol chap. The way I see it, since she wasn't placed under the slave seal, she more animal instinct than the canon version. Happy October to you too! Sure, I'll check into them.

RedBurningDragon: Thank you very much! Filo does have wings, but it slipped my mind for a moment. I'll have to go back and fix it. Besides, we all know those three are complete idiots.

OechsnerC: Thanks!

Guest 1: That does sound amusing! I think I might need to add in a scene of Yuudai screwing with the three heroes or king trash.

: It does feel nice to write this story. It just requires more thinking than my usual writing since it is more popular. The wait usually is worth it though!

Chapter 19: To The Hot Springs

"Welcome! Please, have a nice stay!" A nice lady tells Yuudai, Raphtalia and Filo. Filo happens to be in her human form to not scare away anyone.

"Thank you." Yuudai responds walking away with a room key.

The trio are currently at a hot spring in the mountains. It had taken them two days to arrive, but it's not like there were many things to worry about. Yuudai, however, had used every moment thinking about what happened while fighting the dragon. Or massacring it, but that's beside the point.

It seems to be a typical high end place. In addition to the relaxing surroundings, there hasn't been even one poster with his name on it. This made his feel relaxed enough to order a room for the night. After all, what's better than a warm bed?

Yuudai digs into one of the money pouches and hands some money to Filo and Raphtalia. "That's the money for anything that you feel like you need or want for our stay." He explains simply.

The two nod running off for their bathing needs. Well Raphtalia is, but Filo is just happily sipping after Raphtalia. As they turn the corner, Yuudai walks into the three bedroom. He looks around for anything weird, but oddly doesn't find anything.

The teen then sits on his bed closing his eyes. He has found that accessing his abilities is best done while searching in his mind or body. He already threw away the idea the dragon leaving an effect on him due to it never showing up in his status screen. This his first time having no interruptions though.

An unknown rage starts to rise in his mind and body after him finding a small red dot in him mind. Assuming that there are colors in the mind. He delves deeper into the weird red dot starting to hear a voice.

[You aren't supposed to access this ability yet. Leave.]

And just like that, he is metaphorically thrown out of his mind. He realizes his fist are clenched to the point of bleeding from the palm of his hand. The anger he felt is slowly leaving, but it was not something he was used to. The anger he felt was a blind rage rather than his usual anger.

The door opens quickly revealing his two friends. Both are smiling and laughing. The sight brings a smile to his own face.

"So are you two ready to for the bathing portion?" Yuudai asks forcing himself to keep his smile. Maybe he'll find a way to get into that red dot another way later.

"Yeah!"

He smiles gathering his towel then walking with the girl until they have to separate. It isn't a public area, so boys and girls are supposed to be in opposite pools. It doesn't really matter to Yuudai though.

He walks into the water in his swimwear. His body starts to relax surprising him. He hasn't felt so relaxed since his time in Saxe-Gotha. He can't say as relaxed, but can say it's very close.

"Yay!" Filo's voice shouts jumping into his vision.

He deadpans as she enters the water with a giant splash. Yuudai is just glad she has a white one piece swimsuit. Otherwise he'd be in the presence of a naked girl that he can say for certain is a loli.

"So why are you here, Filo?" Yuudai questions looking around. He doesn't find anyone else. That sets off red alarms. "I've heard about enough hentai to know where this is going...please don't let it happen."

Filo looks his way showing a bright and happy smile. "Well Yuudai-sama came here and I wanted to be with you." She explains.

Raphtalia quickly appears behind Yuudai staring Filo down. "We're not supposed to be here!" She tells Filo while blushing. Her swimwear is a simple bikini top and bottom.

Yuudai sighs knowing what Filo's response will be. "Why? Nobody is here anyway." She asks innocently.

"The longer this goes on, the more I feel like I'm in some kind of horribly written fanfiction." Yuudai groans.

Raphtalia tilts her head as well as Filo. "Fanfiction? What's that?" Filo questions.

Yuudai leans against the side of the spa pool. "It is a story based off of a story already written. It is sometimes super original to super...lemon." he explains shuddering at the last word.

Real World

"Really dude?" A black haired guy asks his friend.

Naofumi stares him down definitely. "Your disrespect for a loli disgusts me, you degenerate." He states.

A fire sparks in the guy's eyes. "You have never experienced a loli until you have written a fanfiction of a dragon loli!" He announces loudly.

Naofumi gains the same spark getting closer to his face. "I won't let you continue your perverse crusade!"

"Your desperate attempts will fail, fellow degenerate!"

With Yuudai

"You two should probably go back." Yuudai tells them casually.

The lady at the desk runs into the room with a look of concern. "I'm sorry, but you girls will have to bathe here as well." She informs them. Yuudai's jaw drops. "The female bathing area is down due to another employee's lack of cleaning. I hope this doesn't inconvenience you three in any way."

Raphtalia smiles at her understandingly. "It's no inconvenience at all, ma'am. We'll just bathe with our friend here."

Yuudai slowly goes underwater all the way. He almost got away with alone time. So very close. Now he'll have to face the hormones that come with being a guy with one half naked girl and another hyper little girl. The hormones specifically involving Raphtalia.

The lady nods walking out of the bathing area. Raphtalia then gets into the water getting herself comfortable. Seeing as it's pointless to stay under, Yuudai brings his head back up to the surface. His eyes dart between the two girls.

"You two…what did you do?" Yuudai questions feeling like they did something.

Raphtalia laughs nervously. "Raphtalia and Filo threw grass, dirt and worms in the other pool then pretended to not know!" Filo explains cheerfully.

The teen boy sighs. "That explains why Raphtalia was blushing instead of being stern." He mutters. "Oh well. It doesn't matter, I guess."

In his mind, a sudden rage tries to release itself causing him to clench his fist underwater. He quickly reigns down the rage. He knows exactly what caused it, but doesn't know why.

"Uh, Yuudai? Are you feeling good? You look like you just heard Motoyasu's voice." Raphtalia says leaning towards him.

Yuudai looks at her, but his eyes glue themselves to gap he is being presented with. He shakes his head blushing. "Yeah, I'm fine." He replies.

Seeing as the rage was spontaneous, he now needs to keep on guard. Otherwise, gain control of that weird power inside him. That's his thinking process, anyway.

"He saw your-" Filo goes to say, but Yuudai moves quickly tackling her underwater.

He pops his head above the water feigning a sad look. "I'm sad to say this, but our Pokemon died." He tells her.

Filo rises back up laughing innocently. It seems that Raphtalia understands what Filo was trying to explain. This is due to her raising her arm to cover the gap between her breasts while blushing like Yuudai. If she is offended, she isn't verbally telling anybody.

Yuudai glares at his bird friend. "I know you won't hell and that pisses me off." Yuudai states comedically. It seems that some real anger was there too, but it's from that thing inside him again.

This isn't apparent to the others though. Raphtalia giggles while Filo laughs harder. Imaginary question marks then appear above her head.

"What's hell?" She asks.

Yuudai and Raphtalia look at each other. "I promise to do this as long as you do the birds and the bees talk." Yuudai offers her.

"Not happening. I'll do this and you will do the other." Raphtalia opposes.

"How about we tell her nothing?" Yuudai suggests.

"I'm fine with that." She replies.

The noise dies down after that. A comfortable silence relaxing them more than they imagined it would. It stays that way for two hours.

Raphtalia looks around for the fifth time in an hour alone. "What's with the looking around?" Yuudai questions calmly.

"I'm not used to being comfortable for long periods of time." Raphtalia starts to explain. "Once I thought of that, I started looking for something or someone coming for our lives."

"So you're paranoid?" He questions simply.

"Yes."

"I would be too, but that'd ruin the point of coming here." Yuudai states still leaning against the wall of the pool.

[You wanted this power, did you not?! Then stop resisting!]

Yuudai mentally smirks. 'If the price is rage then why would I risk it around my friends?'

"I was unaware others were here." A monotone female voice states.

This causes Yuudai to turn his attention towards the door into the water. Standing there is the lady running the place and a very stern looking girl with black hair. Her hair reaches down to her mid back. Strangest part is that she has red eyes and pale skin. Very pale skin.

"I'm sorry miss, but the other isn't in working order at this moment." The employee explains.

The black haired girl's eyes meet Yuudai's own eyes for a moment. In that moment, the two feel a familiarity with each other. Not in the typical sense where you feel you've met, but in a sense you feel as if you have a similar goal.

The girl ignores the employee in favor for walking towards Yuudai. The teen boy gets out of the water to stand eye to eye with her. This confuses Raphtalia and Filo.

The red eyed girl has her kimono on still as she stands in front of Yuudai. "Who are you?" She questions emotionlessly.

"I'm Yuudai. Who are you?" Yuudai answers and questions.

Her eyes look over his body analysing him. Her eyes catch sight of his exposed symbol on his hand. The one that once held his shadow gun and now holds the ability for his Shadow Shield. Her eyes also notice the ring, but doesn't give it much thought.

"What is that symbol for?" The girl asks not answering his question.

Yuudai crosses his arms. "It is simply a symbol I made for my team." He answers. "Now answer my question."

She stares into his eyes looking for any deception. He is either telling the truth or a very good liar because she accepts it as truth. "You should seek shelter with your team soon. Another wave is coming soon." She tells the boy.

Yuudai's eye twitches. "Ignoring the fact you are blatantly ignoring my question, how do you know?" He asks her.

It is understandable why he'd ask. Since the only ones with accurate knowledge of it are higher ups or the four heroes. "I have contact with the Shield Hero, so he warned me about it." She explains.

Raphtalia and Filo raise an eyebrow. Not even they believe her. She may have said it with the best poker face possible, but the real Shield Hero here never said a word. Yuudai refrains from rolling his eyes though.

"You have contact with that Shield Devil?" Yuudai questions with malice etched in his voice.

She raises an eyebrow. "I haven't heard that term before. Please enlighten me."

Yuudai forces a frown to his face. It's not quite right saying such things about himself. It is, however, right that he leads her on. Unintentionally get information out of her. Specifically how she knows of the wave and why she's lying.

"He has raped, assaulted and quite possibly murdered people before." He lists off. It hurts himself, but he keeps up the hateful civilian personality.

"That makes things easier then." She states. The girl bows before him. "Thanks for informing me, Yuudai. My name is Glass, I'm sorry for what is to come." With that, she turns around.

"By the way, don't think too highly of the other three heroes. They're bastards too." Yuudai tells her honestly. "Weak bastards at that. They let that Shield Devil defeat the entire second wave."

She doesn't respond as she leaves the room. While the entire exchange was pointless, Yuudai did find out she has something to do with the wave. He looks at the employee still standing at the door.

"How long has she been here?" Yuudai questions the employee.

"About three days." She answers.

Yuudai nods getting back into the water. "What was that about?" Raphtalia asks.

"I don't know, but I believe we will see her again soon."

End

There we go! Another chapter done!

As always, how was it? I still hope it was good. Now, let's explain some things.

The whole red thing inside him, I am making that the trigger for his Wrath Series shield. If I'm correct, while in his angered state, it was talking to him, so I thought it'd be interesting to have this happen. Then again, who knows.

Next, the Glass appearance. Why wouldn't I? It's not likely she only appeared there during the wave. After all, L'Arc appeared before it, so I decided it would be cool to have them meet. As well as have her realistically be resting up until the wave.

Originally, I wanted this chapter to be a cool down chapter, which it kind of was, but I can't do filler for the life of me. I feel like I must give each chapter importance and amusement at the same time. I'm not the author of Naruto...or Bleach.

I'm sure I could explain more, but I'll save it for later. With that said, thanks for reading, favoriting, following, reviewing and have a great day/night/morning!


End file.
